20th Century Epics: Ben Hur / Gone With The Wind / Doctor Zhivago Clark Gable

A triple bill of Oscar-winning classics. ‘Ben Hur’ (1959) is a lavish biblical epic which won a record-breaking eleven Oscars and is best known for its exciting chariot race sequence. Ben Hur (Charlton Heston) is a Jewish prince who falls out with his close Roman friend (Stephen Boyd) when he refuses to promote Roman rule over his people – his mother and sister are imprisoned and he is enslaved. Hur plans and achieves revenge, but finds true peace when he joins the new following of Jesus Christ. ‘Gone With the Wind’ (1939) is a sprawling American Civil War saga wherein Southern belle Scarlett O’Hara (Vivien Leigh) uses men to get what she wants, but cannot get the one man she truly desires, Ashley Wilkes (Leslie Howard). She soon meets her match in the roguish Captain Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) and in the war itself which destroys the genteel way of life she has always known. With determination she rebuilds her life from the shattered remains the Union Army left behind. Despite its sometimes troubled production (director George Cukor was replaced by Victor Fleming, with Sam Wood brought in when Fleming’s health failed), the film won ten Oscars, including Best Picture, Actor and Actress. ‘Doctor Zhivago’ (1965) saw director David Lean continuing his epic phase with an adaptation of Boris Pasternak’s novel. During World War One, Yuri Zhivago (Omar Sharif) studies to become a doctor in Moscow. He marries his childhood sweetheart, Tonya (Geraldine Chaplin), but is attracted to dressmaker’s daughter Lara (Julie Christie), herself engaged to young revolutionary Pasha (Tom Courtenay), while also conducting an affair with government official Komarovsky (Rod Steiger). Yuri and Lara’s paths cross again in the aftermath of the Bolshevik revolution, and the two begin a passionate affair.