Daily Dialogue — July 29, 2012

Scarlett: Rhett! [runs down the stairs after Rhett] Rhett, Rhett!
[catches him as he’s walking out the front door]
Scarlett: Rhett… if you go, where shall I go, what shall I do?
Rhett Butler: Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.
[Rhett walks off into the fog]

— Scarlett (Vivian Leigh), Rhett Butler (Clark Gable), Gone With The Wind (1939), screenplay by Sidney Howard, novel by Margaret Mitchell

http://static.movieclips.com/embedplayer.swf?shortid=trB5

The Daily Dialogue theme for the week is famous last words, suggested by Vic Tional. Today’s suggestion by lizswan.

Trivia: Sidney Howard agreed to write the screenplay, but from his home in Massachusetts, 3000 miles away from studio interference. His first draft would have made a 5 1/2 hour movie. Howard reluctantly agreed to leave his Massachusetts farm and come to Hollywood to work on another draft with Selznick and then-attached director George Cukor. As Selznick was preoccupied with problems on the set of The Prisoner of Zenda, Howard had to wait 5 weeks before he was able to start working on another draft (in the meantime contributing some rewrites for “Zenda”). The second draft turned out to be 15 pages longer than the first.

Dialogue On Dialogue: Is this the most memorable line in American movie history?