One of the many high points of Gone With the Wind occurs when Rhett Butler, having heard the latest round of rumours about his wife's behavior, drags the longing-to-be-adulterous Scarlett to her beloved Ashley's birthday party, then leaves her at the door, making her face a den of righteous lionesses alone. The drama is wonderfully abetted by the inappropriate/appropriate evening gown Rhett forces his wife to wear: a scandalously red velvet, bejeweled and befeathered. (A gorgeous, though not at all historically correct design by Walter Plunkett.) The beautiful Vivien Leigh never looked more fiercely beautiful, Scarlett never more hypocritically defiant, and it's one of the film's most deliciously tense moments.
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