#004: Marianne

 MARIANNE

Release Date

August 24, 1929

History

Similar to Broadway Melody and Hallelujah, Marianne was filmed simultaneously as both sound and silent versions. While most of the casts were different for the two versions, they featured the same lead actress as the silent version, Marion Davies. Davies was a chorus girl turned silent film star who was nervous about the transition to sound. She would go on to make 16 sound films total over the next few years.

Marianne is an interesting film to watch because it is a war nostalgia film. Today, these films usually cover three wars-- World War II, Korea, or Vietnam. In 1929, however, the nostalgia was for World War I, or The Great War as it was then known. The film is mainly about the army life of soldiers during the war and at the time the idea of a second world war was far from people's conception. Both versions of Marianne were released a decade after the Armistice, which made the nostalgia for the war still a vivid memory. 

In France, the Marianne symbol represents a portrayal of the Goddess of Liberty going back to the French Revolution. The character Marianne represents this symbol in the story of a woman in a small French town Marianne plays host to a platoon passing through the town during the war, while her lover is away fighting. She must choose between the American soldier who loves her and her lover who suddenly returns. 

The other films thus far in this blog haven't followed the traditional musical film presentation of musical numbers, but Marianne is the first MGM musical which follows this format, which would become the standard way of doing musical numbers in musical films through the 1960s. Songs start on a small instrument, such as a ukulele played by Cliff Edwards, and a non-existent orchestra eventually comes in, non-diegetic, backing the number while the character sings. The numbers all have the standard practice of actors lip syncing to a prerecorded track for all of the numbers, whereas a mix of live singing and lip syncing was used in the films prior to Marianne at MGM. Featuring Lawrence Gray and "Ukulele Ike" Cliff Edwards in his third MGM musical thus far, the film has many wonderful songs, and introduced the standard "Just You, Just Me", which was covered by several artists over the years.

Review

When this film started, I was worried it was going to have the same issues that the other films thus far have had, where the line delivery was going to be slow and loud, to compensate for the lack of sound technology at the time. The first scene, where Marianne and her lover Andre say their goodbyes (which is done completely in French) did give off this impression, but then the film picked up, and instantly the acting became more natural, the line delivery and action was faster, and the film began to resemble more of the traditional 1930s comedy pacing that was formulaic of Hollywood in the decade to come. I have two theories on why this may be. The reason could simply be that the film is a comedy, which required a faster pace than Broadway Melody and Hallelujah did.

I think that it could have also been attributed to the fact that time had passed since the advent of sound and working with the technology was becoming more comfortable. Studios had better perfected how to make films with sound, in regard to pacing a sound film vs a silent one, technology to make sure the sound was more intelligible, and also availability of sound equipment. For example, Hallelujah utilized a number of silent hand cranked shots with overdubbed sound. This was minimal in Marianne. The opening shots, a scene where soldiers are washing up and horseplaying later in the film, and some scattered various shots utilize the hand cranked cameras, but otherwise the film is shot with motorized cameras at 24 fps. 

I love that the film tried some experimenting with cinematography. For example, in a funny scene toward the beginning where a soldier Stagg, who has fallen for Marianne, tries telling her about his girl back home and shows her a picture of Mary Pickford thinking Marianne won't know who she is, the camera could have easily been a medium shot for the whole exchange. Instead, the scene is zoomed in and pans back and forth between a closeup of each character as they deliver their lines, resembling how a medium shot is reframed for a phone aspect ratio on a TikTok reel. This seemed unnecessary as a cinematography choice, but I applaud the attempt at something new.

I found myself laughing out loud several times with the film. A memorable scene has Marianne dressing as a French legion soldier to rescue Stagg after he is arrested for stealing a pig she has roasted for a general. Davies in drag is very sexy. It was interesting to see her bend the norms of gender roles in a film as early as 1929, and she pulls off the costume sensationally. Marianne pleads with a general to release Stagg and leans in to touch him. The general pushes him away and says "Uh uh, not in this army!" making a joke about hints of pansexual tendencies in the French Legion. This scene also has a sequence where Marianne is tricked into smoking a cigar, which she has never done before, and Marion Davies' reaction to having to smoke one and nearly getting ill from it was impeccable comedic timing. In a funny follow-up exchange, Stagg says to Marianne "I like you in your own clothes," to which she replies "I like you when you're not so close," playing on how some English words sound similar in a French accent. She's also very funny as she panics about the pig being stolen and goes on a rant in French, yelling to herself. 

Marianne's character is a complex one. She represents a strong woman, hard and jaded from waiting on soldiers who pass through the village while her lover is away fighting. It is clear that Marianne has had to learn how to set hard boundaries from people who have tried stripping the town of their resources, but still wants to be helpful to soldiers who come through. She keeps the soldiers in line, and is constantly pushing away their advances. There's a joke where the soldiers think that the four children she is raising are her own, from four different men, and one of the soldiers says "Maybe she'll give a Yankee a break", which insinuates she will be willing to sleep with the soldiers after they've been away from women for so long. Davies performance as Marianne hints that this is not the first group of men who have come through the town where she's had to fight off advances and she's grown tired of it. 

The visit from the army is beginning to test her morals. She questions whether to kill and cook a pig that the children she is raising loves to serve a general for 200 francs. Her character has a soft side that appears from time to time. When she kicks out Stagg for getting fresh with her, she finally breaks down and smiles with flattery at his attempt, but only when he is not looking. Her demeanor with the men is very stiff and scolding, but with the four children she is very warm. In the scene where she has to roast their favorite pig for the general, they are in tears over it and she is very kind to them, consoling them as she covers the pig in its own gravy from the oven.

Marianne struggles with her love for Stagg. She wants to be faithful to Andre, which could be what is making her act so stiff around the other men. However, she finally concedes, thinking that Andre may never come home. Of course, he does, and is now blind. Andre does not want Marianne to stay with him out of pity, but Marianne feels an obligation even though she is in love with Stagg. There is a beautiful scene where Andre insists she say she loves him with all her heart, and being blind, he doesn't see that she actually looks at Stagg to say it instead of him. 

Marianne and the soldiers have a cultural barrier, like the scene when she finds that they have stolen the pig at the beginning of the film. These men are man-children and show no sign of maturity. She becomes a mother to them, and after taking care of them during their time in the village, they shower her with gifts before they are about to leave and continue fighting in the war. The night before they leave, she does impressions of Maurice Chevalier and other stars of the time, and sings a French ballad before doing another rendition of the number in an upbeat jazz rendition as the soldiers sing along. I found it interesting that MGM would allow Davies to do an impression of a famous actor of that same time from another studio, at a time when studios were very secular and didn't like to mix stars from other studios. I also thought about how this scene symbolized a predecessor to what we now know as the USO, where Marianne is trying to entertain these troops and give them a fun evening before they are shipped out to do more fighting. When the men finally do leave, she breaks down. Part of this is losing Stagg, but as she says goodbye to the men, she comes across as a mother saying goodbye to her children as they go off to war because she has grown so close to them.

I was most interested in the war nostalgia in this film, and how it was done in a warm and happy way, as opposed to a grim portrayal in later films like All Quiet on the Western Front. There are moments that are serious, such as the montage at the beginning of the film showing the ruins of the war, but the theme of camaraderie among the men is strong. Remembering that this film was made only 10 years after the war ended, and that World War I did have a required draft, it's safe to assume the film was very relatable to audiences at the time. Seeing the men as they whip each other with towels when they wash and line up for food may appear to be glamorizing the war life that so many soldiers were faced with, but I think the intention was to show a fondness among the soldiers.

This is most clear in the relationship between Cliff Edwards' character Soapy and Benny Rubin's character Sam. These two are best friends and are always in shenanigans together. At one point the two characters feud and Sam threatens to start a new life without Soapy after the war. Soapy asks if he can still be a part of it, showing a platonic relationship between the two. Later in the film, Sam lays his head in Soapy's lap, giving off a bit of a homoerotic vibe between them. When the film cuts to the last section in New York, it is revealed that Stagg, Soapy, and Sam all own a business together and have stayed unashamedly close after the war.

Cliff Edwards as Soapy steals the show with his numbers. Edwards was best known for being Jiminy Cricket in the Disney film Pinocchio. Here, he sings fun songs such as "When I See My Sugar" and "Hang On to Me" (while Benny Rubin does a soft shoe in the background). Hearing the original rendition of "Just You Just Me" was nice, as I've known the song from Judy Garland's Carnegie Hall album for years, and didn't know this was its origin. It's always nice to hear original renditions of American Songbook songs. Marion Davies has a wonderful alto voice that she speak-sings her numbers with, and it works well for her character in the film.

Benny Rubin sings a fun song (which he does in speak-rhyme earlier in the film) called "Girl From Noochateau". Throughout the film it's obvious that Rubin's character Sam is Jewish, through his jokes about eating the pig they've stolen, his Yiddish accent, and his stereotypical mannerisms. "Girl From Noochateau" is his big song, and it's a time capsule of how Jewish people were portrayed in film prior to World War II. As he sings humorously about his woman, who does traditional Jewish things like cooking Gefilte fish, the soldiers clap and watch him dance. It shows that as a Jewish soldier, he and his culture were embraced by the other soldiers. This number is not a caricature of Jewish culture, but rather done in good humor, embracing the Jewish population, both in the army and those watching the film.

If there was any criticism I would give the film, it would be that while Marion Davies and the rest of the cast does an amazing job with the comedy scenes, the acting during the dramatic scenes is a bit over the top and not quite on par with how drama in sound film would present itself in the next year or so. While the comedy makes the 1929 production value appear charming, the dramatic scenes makes the 1929 production value seem dated. Overall though, I really enjoyed this picture.

Home Video

This transfer came from a 1.20:1 aspect ratio source, and it was nice that the Warner Archive was able to find a source that presented the film in its original aspect ratio as opposed to the cropped 1.37:1 from an alternative source. However, that being said, this film source was definitely lacking in other respects. In an early scene where Marianne firsts makes dinner for the soldiers, a splice cuts part of the film because there is missing dialogue. In general, throughout the film, when there is missing picture but there is audio from the sound element, the Warner DVD goes to black slug while the audio continues, and comes back when the picture is available. For a film that is so dialogue heavy and relies on this dialogue, I can see that this was a good choice as an alternative to cutting from the dialogue regularly. Still, I do wonder if since this DVD was released eight years ago if another source has been found. My guess, knowing the hard work that Warner Archive was doing at this time, was that there weren't a lot of good elements to choose from. 

The sound quality on the other hand was pretty fantastic. I could understand all of the dialogue, the songs had great fidelity, and the element was clearly more complete than the picture element. The only criticism I had was that there is a slight variation in the fidelity and sound quality between reels. While the opening credits say that the sound was done by Western Electric System, which implies that this was Sound-on-Film and not a separate acetate disc process, it's unclear if the sound masters were from an optical negative or from acetate disc masters. If disc masters were used, it can be understood that some were in better shape than others and this affected the quality of the transfer. If, however, an optical negative was used, then the volume and fidelity should have matched across the film, and it means that someone possibly wasn't checking sound levels when the film transfer was made for this home video release. Overall though, this was only slightly noticeable, and shouldn't take away from the gratitude I had that this film was finally remastered and released for home video.