“GONE WITH THE WIND”

Wairarapa Times-Age, 31 May 1940, Page 9

“GONE WITH THE WIND”

A GREAT BOX OFFICE ATTRACTION. MORE BIG PRODUCTIONS. Second features and the cheap admission prices that have made filmsvihe world's most popular entertainment may soon be “gone with the wind.”

In a few weeks of restricted showing in key theatres in America alone “Gone With The Wind” has taken at the box-office over £1.000,000. To appreciate what' that means, you must realise that the figure is exceeded by the total world takings of only three films in the whole of Hollywood’s history. Those three films were: “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” £2,000.000; “The Singing Fool,” £1,250,000; “The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,” £1,125.000; “Ben Hur” took £1,000,000. It looks as if Selznick’s estimate of a total gross for the film of £5,000,000, considered fantastic by the wiseacres a few months ago, may turn out to be a conservative one. Film accountants believe that the picture will bring in £6,000.000 in the first year and that it will be running —with repeated reissues—for at least ten years. Selznick’s share (with that of M.G.M.) will be seventy per cent—that it to say, £4,200,000 in the first twelve months. Money talks more loudly in Hollywood than in any town on earth, and all the major producers who have for years been itching to let themselves really go are frantically embarking on “big money” pictures that will run for four hours. In their present mood of intoxication induced by the “G.W.T.W.” figures no one can persuade them that the Margaret Mitchell story is an unusual picture, particularly as by a coincidence several other current largescale pictures, notably “Grapes of Wrath” and “Abe Lincoln in Illinois,” have been doing good business in New York.

They think that all they have to do now is to spend two years and a million pounds on a production, charge a fancy admission price and sit back while the millions roll in. Someone is going to get a nasty and expensive shock.