Synopses & Reviews
How and why has the saga of Scarlett Oand#8217;Hara kept such a tenacious hold on our national imagination for almost three-quarters of a century? In the first book ever to deal simultaneously with Margaret Mitchelland#8217;s beloved novel and David Selznickand#8217;s spectacular film version of
Gone with the Wind, film critic Molly Haskell seeks the answers. By all industry predictions, the film should never have worked. What makes it work so amazingly well are the fascinating and uncompromising personalities that Haskell dissects here: Margaret Mitchell, David Selznick, and Vivien Leigh. As a feminist and onetime Southern adolescent, Haskell understands how the story takes on different shades of meaning according to the age and eye of the beholder. She explores how it has kept its edge because of Margaret Mitchelland#8217;s (and our) ambivalence about Scarlett and because of the complex racial and sexual attitudes embedded in a story that at one time or another has offended almost everyone.
Haskell imaginatively weaves together disparate strands, conducting her story as her own inner debate between enchantment and disenchantment. Sensitive to the ways in which history and cinema intersect, she reminds us why these characters, so riveting to Depression audiences, continue to fascinate 70 years later.
Review
"In engaging and witty fashion, Haskell seamlessly weaves together biographical and autobiographical issues, production information, sharp critical commentary, and cogent analysis of the literary, social and political context of both the Margaret Mitchell novel and the David Selznick adaptation. She gives us numerous important insights into the deep mythology of the film and its ability to function as 'the Bible of America.'"and#8212;James Naremore, Indiana University
Review
"This is a beautifully written and well-detailed account of the making of a movie that has, by now, become an American treasure, a landmark in popular entertainment. And itand#8217;s written by a real Southerner, who happens to be one of the best writers on film we have."and#8212;Martin Scorsese
Review
and#8220;Beautifully written and fascinating to digest, Molly Haskell's Frankly, My Dear towers above any other book that's yet been written about Gone with the Wind. It has the kind of insights into the Wind phenomenon that only a writer of Molly Haskell's stature, wisdom and clarity could give us. It is quite the perfect toast to both the book and to the film version of Wind on the latter's 70th birthday."and#8212;Robert Osborne, Host of Turner Classic Movies
Review
"With her sharp feeling for movie culture, sexual politics, and the elusive mores of the old South, Molly Haskell brilliantly sketches theandnbsp;contribution of everyone who shaped
Gone with the Wind into a problematic butandnbsp;enduring popular classic."and#8212;Morris Dickstein, author of
Gates of Eden and
Leopards in the TempleReview
"Molly Haskell has written a new book about Gone With the Wind. If you give a damn about this subject, I urge you to seek it out."and#8212;Pamela Fiori, Town and Country
Review
"A stunning piece of criticism, written with fever-pitch intensity, that demonstrates so movingly why it's impossible to name the kind of greatness found in
Gone with the Wind and impossible to refrain from trying."and#8212;Alan Trachtenberg, author of
Lincoln's Smileandnbsp;andandnbsp;Other EnigmasReview
"Molly Haskell is a magician toandnbsp;coaxandnbsp;such exciting, fresh, brilliant analysis from such a problematic classic.andnbsp; Her feeling for ambivalence and nuanceandnbsp;reveals unsuspected shadings, and thrillingly elucidates Gone with the Windand#8217;s miraculous tightrope act of masculine-feminine sensibilities."and#8212;Phillip Lopate
Review
and#8220;An absolutely marvelous workand#8212;provocative, perceptive, richly informative, and written with a contagious passion. Molly Haskell has given all of us who are in thrall to Gone with the Wind countless fresh insights, not only about its characters and the era in which they lived, but also about ourselves and our own times.and#8221;and#8212;Olivia de Havilland
Review
"Haskell's feminist perspective comes to the rescue of a film most academics won't touch and current critics dismiss."and#8212;New York Times Book Review (Editors' Choice)
Review
"What Molly Haskell does so deftly is dismiss conventional wisdom about Gone With the Wind."and#8212;Margaret Moser, Austin Chronicle
Review
"A smart, sassy, and sophisticated reappraisal of the novel and the movie."and#8212;Glenn C. Altschuler, Tulsa World
Review
and#8220;. . .andnbsp;an earnest work of moviegoer remembrance thatand#8217;s also affectionate scholarshipandnbsp;. . .andnbsp;Haskell clarifies the long shadow that Scarlett Oand#8217; Hara casts over the American movie imagination.and#8221; and#8212; Armond White,
International Herald TribuneReview
and#8220;The era of Scarlett Oand#8217;Hara is long
Gone with the Wind but her story still fires our imagination. Molly Haskell explains why it mattered and,
Frankly My Dear, why it continues to.and#8221; - Elissa Schappell,
Vanity FairReview
". . . affectionate scholarship . . . [Haskell] disentangles the film's qualities from the confounding issues of misogyny, racism and intellectual snobbery. . . . Haskell's critical sensitivity rescues Scarlett's Americanism and femininity, indicating how her image rebounds upon our eternal political struggles and deepest fantasies . . . "and#8212;Armond White,
New York Times Book ReviewReview
". . . Molly Haskell . . . rises to the task of explaining this uniquely American cultural phenomenon by boldly burrowing into both the 1936 best seller by Margaret Mitchell and the big-screen epic it inspired. . . . It leaves you yearning to return to Tara . . ."and#8212;Susan Wloszczyna, USA Today
Review
"Molly Haskell applies her deep movie knowledge, feminist eye, and Southern roots to a fiercely smart appreciation of Gone With the Wind. . . ."and#8212;Entertainment Weekly
Review
"It's near exhilarating to read Molly Haskell's Frankly, My Dear, a revisitation that explores the reverberating complexities of the Margaret Mitchell franchise. . . . "and#8212;Steve Coates, New York Times
Review
". . . Molly Haskell is interested in the meeting points between film, sociology and history, and she writes about all of them, together and separately, with ease and authority. . . . Her research and insightsand#8212;her intelligent understanding of all she surveysand#8212;are unsurpassed. . . .and#8221; and#8212; Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle
Review
and#8220;[Haskelland#8217;s] passion for her subject is whopping, and her book is a flat-out must for any fan of epic Hollywood. She doesnand#8217;t tell all the stories and#8212; only the ones worth hearing, and they gleam in between ingeniously fevered pages on slavery, or startling memories of Haskelland#8217;s Virginian schoolmates climaxing on first reading the book. A near-perfect example of how cinema ought to be written about.and#8221;and#8212;Antonia Quirke,
The Times (UK)Review
Chosen as an Outstanding Academic Title for 2009 by Choice Magazine The Times (UK)
Review
“Besides her unique and crucial role in American feminism, Haskell is also one of the best writers on film in America, and both as a critic and stylist shes only getting better.”--
The L Magazine Choice
About the Author
Molly Haskell is a writer and film critic. She has lectured widely on the role of women in film and is the author of From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies. She lives in New York City.