Years & Movies: 1939

The best movie of world cinema of 1939, according to FilmGourmand, is "Gone With the Wind". Directors Victor Fleming, George Cukor, Sam Wood.

The premiere of "Gone With the Wind" was held in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, December 15, 1939. The film reached European screens after 4-5 years, which is absolutely understandable: the Second World War was raging in Europe. Accordingly, the participation of the film in prestigious European and Asian film festivals was out of the question. But in the homeland, in the USA, the film received 13 Oscar nominations, of which 8 won, including the most important ones - as the Best Picture and for Best Director. In addition, the film received without nominations another 2 honorary Oscars for technical achievements.

"Gone With the Wind" became the very first color film and the longest film to win an Oscar as the Best Picture.

The Academy award for Best Director was awarded to Victor Fleming. How fair this decision was can only be judged by taking into account the following circumstances. David O. Selznick bought the film rights to Margaret Mitchell's novel "Gone With the Wind" in July 1936 - a month after publication. The transaction cost is 50 thousand dollars. And immediately after purchasing the film rights on behalf of Selznick, George Cukor began directing development. The actual shooting of the film under the direction of Cukor began at the end of January 1939 and was quite successful thanks to a deep and comprehensive pre-production study.

However, less than three weeks later, Selznick fired Cukor as Director of the film. The formal reason for Selznick's dismissal was that Cukor, being a homosexual, would not be able to properly film the love scenes between Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh. However, people in the know said that the real reason for Cukor's dismissal was an urgent request from Clark Gable. Allegedly, Cukor, moving in homosexual circles, received information about Gable's extensive experience as a male escort, in other words, a gigolo. Fearing the spread of this information, Gable insisted on Cukor's removal. Clark Gable, who 4 years earlier for his role in the film "It happened one night" won an Academy award, on the set of "Gone With the Wind" was in the position of favorite. Suffice it to say that Vivien Leigh for 125 shooting days received a fee of 25 thousand dollars, and Gable - for 71 shooting days - 120 thousand dollars. But the Academy award for his role in this film did not go to him.

Anyway, Cukor was replaced by Victor Fleming, who had a reputation in cinematic circles as a macho man. Vivien Leigh suffered greatly from this substitution, because for her, a British intellectual and convent school pupil, phrases like "Shove this script up your skinny British ass", which Victor Fleming hourly confirmed his typical American machismo, were akin to torture. The only saving grace was that Cukor agreed, unbeknownst to Selznick and Fleming, to continue directing with Vivien Leigh and Olivia De Havilland on weekends. Plus, when Vivien's patience reached the limit, and she was ready to leave the shooting, Fleming suddenly went on vacation himself, citing fatigue. In fact, while working on "Gone With the Wind", Fleming was completing the "Wizard of Oz".

During Fleming's vacation, the reins passed to Sam Wood. It is estimated that Cukor had eighteen days of filming, Fleming - ninety-three, and Wood - twenty-four. On September 9, 1939, a preliminary display of the picture took place. In other words, the whole process of making the film took 7.5 months. Estimate, was it possible to make a film lasting more than 4 hours in such a period without serious preliminary directorial study? And after that, evaluate the fairness of the Academy Award winning only by Victor Fleming.

British actress Vivien Leigh in the competition for the main role in this film surpassed 1,400 American applicants. And this despite the fact that by the time the filming began, Vivien Leigh was already 25 years old, while the heroine of the novel at the beginning was 16 years old. However, the author of the novel Margaret Mitchell herself approved the actress for this role, although she initially saw Catherine Hepburn as the female lead. Meanwhile, even before the start of filming within the framework of the PR company of the film, moviegoers were invited to vote for candidates for the main role. For Vivien Leigh, only one vote was cast. Democracy, however.

On the night of the premiere of the film "Gone With the Wind" in 1939, about 300 thousand people gathered near the cinema who wanted to personally greet the creators of the picture.

Black actors who starred in the film were forbidden to attend the premiere. The same requirement extended to Hattie McDaniel, who later won the Academy Award for female supporting role in this film. Clark Gable threatened the organizers of the premiere with a boycott of the premiere if McDaniel was not allowed. It is not known whether he would fulfill his threat, but the actress persuaded him to go to the premiere. It is quite possible that he would have done it, since he himself was not enthusiastic about this film and his role in it, dismissively calling the film "a woman's picture".

Hattie McDaniel was persecuted for participating in this film by the black community, which reproached her for agreeing to the role of a handmaid and playing up to racist sentiments. To these attacks, the actress replied that she prefers to play handmaids for $ 700 a week than to work as a handmaid with a salary of $ 7 per week.

With a budget of almost $ 4 million, the film has raised over $ 400 million worldwide. And if we make adjustments for inflation, then in the prices of 2019, the total box office gross of this painting amounted to $ 1,822,598,200 with the cost of producing the picture at $ 73.5 million. That is, box office revenues were 24 times higher than costs.

Roger Ebert, who rated the film with 4 out of 4 possible stars and called it “an excellent example of Hollywood art”, made a convincing explanation for the success of the film both in the USA and around the world. In his review, which he wrote after the 5th viewing of this film, he concluded that the film was released on time as never before: the Great Depression forced many women to break away from the household and go to work. Under these conditions, the image of a woman, Scarlett O'Hara, able to subordinate her lust and other passions to rationality and practicality, came in handy. Moreover, the World War II loomed on the threshold.

The first screening of the film in the USSR took place in 1969 as part of the Moscow Film Festival. For a wide Soviet audience, the film began to be shown in 1990. And in Russia, the film has always enjoyed constant success, at least not less than in the United States. Suffice it to say that according to IMDB and Kinopoisk, the average viewer rating in the United States for this film was 8.2, and in Russia - 8.3. Overall, 74% of IMDB and Kinopoisk users around the world gave this film a rating of 8 to 10, and 32% - almost every third - rated the film with a top score of "ten."

Among other reasons that ensured the success of the film in Russia, Russian film critic Sergei Kudryavtsev calls a small mistake, perhaps a conscious one, made when translating the name of the film. “But instead of the more meaningful translation of “Gone With the Wind”, it is by no means accidental that the name “Blown Away by the Wind” has taken root. It is more sentimental and romantic, hints at the fate of two rival lovers who do not want to give in to each other. A “Gone With the Wind” - but about something else: about the time that the Old South irrevocably passed away and the world of wealthy Atlanta estates that flourished thanks to slavery; about the inevitable course of History, which intervenes in the life of the country and individuals. The banal “wind of the era” dispelled illusions and hopes those who tried to preserve the integrity of an already outdated society."

Based on the listed indicators of the success of the film "Gone With the Wind", its rating according to the version of FilmGourmand was 8.431, due to which it occupies 349th place in the Golden Thousand.

So, the guru of American film critic Roger Ebert, as was quoted above, directly connected the success of the American film masterpiece with the specifics of the historical moment.

In addition to "Gone With the Wind", the following films are included in the top ten best films of world cinema of 1939 by FilmGourmand:

- La regle du jeu (The Rules of the Game). Director Jean Renoir, France. Movie's rating - 8,321; 400th rank in the Golden Thousand
- Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Director Frank Capra, USA. Movie's rating 8,088; 598th rank in the Golden Thousand
- Подкидыш (The Foundling). Director Tatyana Lukashevich, USSR. Movie's rating 8,075; 617th rank in the Golden Thousand
- The Roaring Twenties. Director Raoul Walsh, USA. Movie's rating 7,997; 710th rank in the Golden Thousand
- The Wizard of Oz. Directors Victor Fleming, George Cukor, Mervyn LeRoy, Norman Taurog, King Vidor, USA. Movie's rating 7,979; 733rd rank in the Golden Thousand
- Ninotchka. Director Ernst Lubitsch, USA. Movie's rating 7,950; 788th rank in the Golden Thousand
- Stagecoach. Director John Ford, USA. Movie's rating 7,849; 922nd rank in the Golden Thousand
- Le Jour se Leve (Daybreak). Director Marcel Carne, France. Movie's rating 7,803; 970th rank in the Golden Thousand
- The Women. Director George Cukor, USA.

10 most "cinegenic"*, in our opinion, events of 1939:

- "Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact". By the beginning of 1939, the establishment of domination to one degree or another by Hitlerite Germany over the whole of Europe was practically completed: some European countries - Germany, Italy, Hungary, and later Spain - signed the Anti-Comintern Pact, which directly and unequivocally announced aggressive intentions towards the USSR. another part of Europe - Poland, Great Britain, France - concluded non-aggression pacts with Hitler's Germany, and a number of other countries - Austria, Czechoslovakia, part of the territory of Lithuania - were occupied by Germany, however, without much resistance. France, as a last resort to prevent war, proposed the creation of a "peace front", which would include France, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, Poland and Romania, which would keep Germany from war. The USSR accepted the offer, the rest of the alleged participants refused. Back in 1938, the United States rejected a similar Soviet proposal for a joint defense treaty aimed at countering the rise of Nazi Germany. Hitler, fearing a possible war on two fronts, invited Stalin to conclude a non-aggression pact. Stalin accepted the offer.

- The beginning of the WWII. Having secured itself from the war with the Soviet Union, Germany tore up the non-aggression pact concluded with Poland back in 1934 and invaded this country under a far-fetched pretext. Great Britain, France, India, Australia and New Zealand have declared war on Germany. The United States has declared neutrality. The Red Army, following the agreements spelled out in the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, entered the eastern regions of Poland.

- End of the Spanish Civil War. In Spain, the Civil War ended with the victory of F. Franco. The Francoist dictatorship is established. Great Britain, France and the United States recognized the Franco government and, thereby, supported the anti-Soviet aspirations of Hitlerite Germany.

- The beginning of the Soviet-Finnish war. Since according to the "Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact" Lithuania was assigned to the zone of influence of Germany, the Lithuanian authorities turned to the USSR with a request for protection from the German invasion. The USSR offered Germany to amend the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in the part concerning Lithuania. Germany agreed on the condition of compensation. The USSR paid a significant sum of money and provided Germany with a significant amount of raw materials. This decision of the USSR was met in Lithuania with great joy. Then the USSR, in an ultimatum order, offered Latvia, Lithuania, Finland and Estonia to conclude agreements on mutual assistance. The Baltic countries agreed, and the construction of Soviet military bases began on their territory. Finland refused and war was declared on it. For this, the USSR was expelled from the League of Nations.

- The beginning of the era of nuclear weapons. Niels Bohr, a scientist from Denmark, announced the discovery of uranium fission and thus marked the beginning of the development of nuclear weapons. Albert Einstein, Leo Szilard, Eugene Wigner and Edward Teller sent a letter to US President Franklin D. Roosevelt about the need to develop nuclear weapons to counter Nazi Germany. A letter from scientists marked the beginning of the Manhattan Project.

- Fights near the Khalkhin-Gol River. The Kwantung Army of Japan invaded Mongolia. By the joint efforts of the Red Army and the armed forces of Mongolia, the 6th Army of Japan was defeated at the Khalkhin-Gol River.

- Chilean earthquake. Chile was hit by an earthquake that killed nearly 30,000 people and became the deadliest earthquake in Chile's history.

- Black Friday fire. In Australia, there was a fire that covered an area of more than 2 million hectares and killed 71 people. Several cities were destroyed.

- Slovak-Hungarian War. Guided by the decisions taken in Munich, Hungary made claims for part of the territory of Slovakia with a population of about 1 million people, most of whom were ethnic Hungarians or Rusyns. Disagreeing with these claims, Slovakia declared its independence. Hungary brought its troops into the territory of Slovakia. During the week, hostilities continued, after which Slovakia ceded part of the territory of Hungary.

- IRA war against Great Britain. The Irish Republican Army has declared war on Great Britain in order to assist Nazi Germany. On the territory of Great Britain, the IRA organized a series of terrorist attacks. Explosion in Coventry.

Besides Francis Ford Coppola was born.

* -With "cinematic" in the present context, we mean events that either have already found their reflection in world cinema, or deserve to become the basis of the plot of a future film.