Scarlett (1994): Dammit, I Liked It!

You guys. I was all excited for the next iteration of Snark Week, and I thought, “Aha! I will watch Scarlett, the ill-fated sequel to Gone With the Wind written by a different author in the 1980s, critically panned, and then adapted into a critically panned miniseries in 1994!” I mean, it’ll be comedy gold, right? DAMMIT IF I DIDN’T ENJOY THE FRICKIN’ THING. Oh, there’s shmaltz. There are a few (very few) costume mis-steps. There are truckloads of brown makeup on Every Single Actress. There’s ridiculous, made-up drama. But you know what? I LOVED 95% of the costumes, and I eagerly looked forward to each of the four episodes. MY CREDIBILITY IS RUINED!!!

Let’s get this out of the way: Joanne Whalley is no Vivien Leigh. Timothy Dalton is no Clark Gable. But in terms of their acting, yeah, they kind of nail the parts (as written). Whalley gets Scarlett’s head tossing, and she’s good at bringing the maturity that the story calls for. Dalton’s chin cleft is mesmerizing (and not in a good way), but he really channels Rhett’s cheroot-chewing, devil-may-care, teasing rake. (Although too bad this series wasn’t made today, because imagine George Clooney as Rhett!)

Ashley Wilkes is just as much of a drip as ever.

Ann-Margret as Belle Watling is HILARIOUSLY bad, but I’m entertained by bad acting.

New characters include Anne Hampton (played by Annabeth Gish) as the new Melanie (quite good)…

…and Jean Smart (the blonde from Designing Women) as the ludicrous Sally, all tomboy brashness. Apparently Jean is allowed to run her buggy into another, literally smashing it to bits, and no-one cares that she doesn’t stop. No consequences! Oh isn’t she charming.

Sean Bean’s character is preposterously OTT, but then, this is channeling 1930s melodrama, so shouldn’t he be? And really, any excuse to hear Sean Bean talk — rowr. I’d forgotten how sexy his voice is.

And let us not forget Colm Meaney, who is fine in his role, just — we’re going to Ireland, of course we are contractually obliged to cast Colm Meaney!

The story IS preposterous, although 1) so is the original GWTW, and 2) it’s trying to channel the OTT-ness of 1930s melodrama, and 3) the book on which it’s based is in some ways worse (um, Scarlett moves to Ireland, decides she no longer cares about the mythical TARA, and gives up wearing corsets for good? I think not). I think the top shmaltzy moment is when Rhett is exercising a horse in the middle of the night (as one does), and then imagines Scarlett riding the horse in a diaphanous nightgown. I do believe I spit water I was laughing so hard.

Racially, it’s nearly as tone-deaf as GWTW, although in a different way. All of the African American characters are beloved by the white people, adore the white people right back, and are happy to be swept to the sidelines. Shrill nitwit Prissy is replaced by Pansy (Rakie Ayola), but she’s utterly nondescript.

Big Sam is there, jolly as ever, and happily successful in business — there’s no racist culture of violence in the South of Scarlett, oh no!

There’s even some revisionism — despite Margaret Mitchell removing the “N” word for the almost-as-bad “darkies” shortly before publication, there’s a scene in which an Irish character explains the word “paddy” to Scarlett as being akin to the “N” word, and she protests, “I would NEVEH use that word!” Sure you wouldn’t, Scarlett. Sure you wouldn’t. (Note: I’m not saying Scarlett ever did use that word in the books or movie. Just that Scarlett suddenly proclaiming that this word is verboten, when racism completely underlies the original book and movie, is ludicrous. Sorry, if you’re going to update a racist classic, you have to deal with your history.) And, Scarlett goes to visit family in Ireland and gets a bit political about the whole English situation, but doesn’t seem to see any parallels to the South.

Costumes in Scarlett

The costumes were designed by Marit Allen (Snow White: A Tale of Terror, Ride With the Devil, Love in the Time of Cholera) and cover 1873 to 1877.

The Good – There’s Lots of It!

Okay So It Isn’t All Perfect

For one thing, the film jumps around a bit in terms of silhouette — Scarlett will be wearing a larger-skirted, hooped bustle silhouette (1869-72ish) in one scene, then a natural form silhouette (1877-1879ish) then next. But more importantly…

I mentioned brown makeup above. I didn’t mean brownface, I just mean that clearly the makeup designer(s) thought that using brown and orange tones for the applied-with-a-trowel makeup would read as “natural.” And it kind of works, until you see people in close-up, and shudder.

And it’s not just Scarlett:

While the hair was mostly great, there were some times when somebody got a little too enthusiastic with the Aquanet:

There were a few semi-ugly dresses:

And early on, Scarlett and Rhett attend a masquerade ball. Scarlett is dressed as Elsa from Frozen a Snow Queen, and while I know they did sometimes wear fancy dress costumes that didn’t follow fashionable lines, her sleek, medieval-style dress seemed a bit much. Meanwhile Rhett was dressed as the worst Renfaire pirate EVER (although Scarlett does tease him about how ridiculous he looks, which, yes).

And while yes, while you need to costume prostitutes to look like prostitutes, Ann-Margret and her trusty sidekick are designed with a sledgehammer.

 

So. Yeah. What objectively cheesy movies do you secretly love?