#007: Devil-May-Care

DEVIL-MAY-CARE

Release date 

December 27, 1929

History

Devil-May-Care is noteworthy in cinema in that it, like other films from 1929, documents the transition from silent to sound for many of its production team-- notably in this film its director, Sidney Franklin, and leading man, Ramon Novarro. Sidney Franklin directed his first three sound films in 1929. One, The Last of Mrs. Cheyney, was a synchronized sound film, with music and sound effects only, while Devil-May-Care and Wild Orchids were both his first sound films with dialogue. 

Ramon Novarro was a Hollywood superstar at the time of making this film, most notably for his role in 1925's Ben-Hur. 1929 was the year that Hollywood deemed "talkie" films would take over the silent film market. Novarro had done two other films that year which were synchronized sound films, but this would be his first film with dialogue, and to top it all off, his role would be a French soldier, which meant he'd have to also speak with an accent. Sound technology was still rudimentary, and this meant a third challenge would be added to Novarro's performance-- he would have to perform the role convincingly while speaking his lines slowly and loudly into the microphone. This was not going to be an easy feat, but it could mean the end of his career if he couldn't pull it off. Novarro did, however, and his film career would continue through 1960 with a small career in television lasting until his tragic murder in 1968.

The film features a two-strip Technicolor color sequence featuring the Albertina Rasch dancers. Albertina Rasch was a Viennese dancer who emigrated to the United States in 1910, becoming a dancer in shows at venues like the Hippodrome before starting her own dance company. She would go on to choreograph several dance sequences for MGM, such as the one featured here. 

Review

Devil-May-Care tells the story of Armand, a Bonaparte (which is a nickname for one of Napoleon's soldiers, not necessarily someone of Napoleon's family, and this confused me dreadfully for the first 30 minutes). Armand escapes an execution attempt for treason and sneaks into the home of a local woman named Leoni. Leoni is loyal to the monarchy, and has no tolerance for the Bonaparte party, and turns Armand in to soldiers who come to capture him. He escapes by thrashing the soldier who goes into the closet he hides in and stealing his clothes, and tells Leoni that she is the most beautiful woman he has met before leaving. He runs to the chateau of his friend, Louise. Louise is a countess, and vows to keep Armand safe by hiring him as a chauffer and letting him take the pseudonym Charles. Unfortunately, Louise's cousin happens to be Leoni, who comes to visit for a long stay. Armand recognizes her, but she does not recognize him, for it was too dark the night that he broke into her home. He must now hide his identity from the French soldiers while wooing Leoni, and leading a double life from her.

Armand is serious about his loyalty to Napoleon, but not much else. He sings a song making fun of the king while he draws a satirical cartoon of him. When he is called for his execution, he finishes the cartoon before marching away with the soldiers. When he makes a last request to make the commands for his execution, he confuses the execution soldiers by giving them a number of commands, having them turn around and then runs, in a humorous sequence. The soldiers are portrayed as not very bright at the beginning of the film. A humorous line has the head of the army telling his men "Half of you go to the left, half of you to the right, and the rest, follow me," as they chase Armand when he runs away.

While Ramon Novarro as Armand is decent enough to get through the film for his first role with dialogue, that doesn't make it flawless. His accent, for starters, is more Italian than it is French. And while his comedic timing is good, it is much more suited to theater than it is to film in its over the top way. Still, he does have a knack for physical comedy, which probably comes from his ability to perform for silent films in years prior to this production. His singing is decent and he carries the weight of the numbers very well. 

Dorothy Jordan as Leoni is completely miscast. Given, this was only her fourth film and 1929 was her first year as an actress, she simply does not have what it takes to carry the role. This could be why within four years, Jordan nearly vanished from Hollywood, minus a few bit roles in the 1950s. But here, she lacks in her acting, her singing, her shrill speaking voice, and her lack of any attempt to do a European accent (most of the other actors either try a French accent or an English one). Usually I'd shrug at this, but it's annoying because the part of Leoni has so much potential. Leoni is conflicted about her growing feelings for Armand (as Charles) because he is a chauffer, a man far below her stature. She makes up for it by berating him and bossing him around. He likes the attention and is constantly teasing her. Of course, she eventually can't hold back her feelings anymore and when he woos her with a song and kisses her, she is so torn on what to do. Meanwhile, she is also dodging a marriage proposal from DeGrignon, a French soldier who is chasing Armand after his disappearance. At the end of the film, when Leoni learns Armand's identity, she is now more torn about her feelings as it has become another moral journey for her, being an opposer of the Royalist party due to the way her family has struggled during its reign. Still, though, she lets Armand escape because of her love for him.

I felt that the ending of the film didn't age well. Leoni is now engaged to DeGrignon, and Armand, while bitter that Leoni is engaged to him, is convinced by Louise that he loves her and needs to get her back. His method is to bound and gag her when she does not want to go with him and Armand is insistent on taking her whether she "likes it or not". Let's call this what it is, a kidnapping. We will see this theme again in this blog, with Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, but it doesn't age well in a time where we know more about consent and not treating women as though they were property.

I was most taken with the film's cinematography, captured by Merritt B. Gerstad, who had been a cinematographer for about 10 years when this film was made (starting in silent films). The last two MGM musicals that preceded this one, So This is College and It's a Great Life, were lacking in any attempts at artistry with the cinematography. Devil-May-Care does go that extra mile, however. There are a number of shots worth noting, starting at the beginning. As Napoleon addresses his soldiers, there is a nice angular shot that pans across the soldiers as they listen to him. When a traitor is executed by firing squad early in the film, setting the scene for Armand's scheduled execution, smoke fills the screen as the traitor's body falls; this still kept the shot upsetting to watch but not too graphic. 

Later in the film as Armand sings the ballad "Charming" while cleaning shoes in the garden, the camera zooms out slowly to show the kitchen, where other servants look on and gossip about his behavior-- an artistic choice compared to the static medium shots we've seen in other MGM musicals thus far. These long shots are a constant theme in the cinematography, two other examples being where Armand sneaks into Leoni's room later in the film, and there is a long shot of the camera following him up the balcony and to her window, as well as a long shot with the camera in front of Armand riding a horse down a windy rode. During the horse riding scene, where Armand as Charles finally woos Leoni, the landscape shots stand out, which add to the romantic staging of the scene. In the last scene, there is another beautiful outdoors shot, as we see a shot of the lake glimmering behind the trees-- a great way to close out the film.

Gerstad's cinematography regularly utilizes a trick that could have been deemed 'overdone', but every time it is utilized it is a little different and that makes it seem fresh-- especially because it is not something that other MGM musical cinematographers have utilized thus far in the genre. This would be the closeup of a face from the profile on one half of the frame, with important action occurring behind this on the other half of the frame. We first see this in a shot of Napoleon leaving for battle, as he sits in a carriage, looking stoically as the soldiers sing outside of it. The best example, though, is during a conversation between Louise and Leoni where they discuss Leoni's proposal and sing a song about love. The scene is mainly one medium shot of the two of them in bed, but to break up the monotony, Gerstad cuts occasionally to Leoni's side profile out of focus on the right side of the frame with Louise in focus on the left side. Near the end of the film, there is a scene where Napoleon is returning, and he looks at a sail on a boat, and on the sail is a superimposed shot of the army. To me, this was a nod to the German Expressionism films of the 1920s and while a little out of place contextually, it worked.

The one section of cinematography I was disappointed in was the color ballet. It just seemed that if one was going to have a color sequence that stands out, more could have been done, but artistically it was just some boring shots of the dancers as opposed to trying to show off what one could do with color cinematography. It's noted that Albertina Rasch would usually direct her own sequences, so it is very possible Gerstad had nothing to do with the cinematography in this section.

When Hallelujah was made earlier in 1929, hand-cranked cameraa were used heavily. By the time Devil-May-Care was made, the majority of the shots, with or without sound, all appear to be done with a motorized camera so it all is shot at 24 frames per second, including the majority of the shots where characters are doing nothing more than riding a horse. The two exceptions I could find were a shot of Armand joining the Bonaparte army as they ride in, and one shot at the end where Armand and Leoni ride through town at night after he 'rescues' her.

Also noteworthy is the set design in the film. The detail put into the sets, down to the floor tile that is used in Louise's chateau, gives the impression that the studio wanted this to be a larger production. It also shows in the costumes that the characters wear, which are of the period. I will say, though, that it was obvious this was a pre-Code film because of the way the men's pants are tailored. To put it delicately, the in-seam areas on the men's costumes do not hide things as much as they would in a film made a few years later. Interesting in contrast, though, is that Leoni in an equestrian outfit is still wearing a skirt instead of pants. In a few years, the only way a woman would be allowed to wear pants in a film according to the Hayes Code would be if she was in an equestrian outfit.

The film does has dated elements in other areas. After title cards had practically vanished from the last few films that were in the blog, they did appear in this film pretty regularly. Of course, production on this film could have begun earlier than something as low budget and easy to make as It's a Great Life or So This is College which could account for this. Additionally, while the characters can easily be heard and the technology for the sound is much better than some of the other 1929 films, the actors are still resorting to yelling their lines into the microphones even though this no longer needs to be done. Thankfully, because the film plays like a stage comedy in the performances and in the script, it works. Speaking of comedy though, there is a solid 20 minutes toward the end where the film spirals into a drama as Armand and Leoni pine for each other and he is being hunted down by soldiers. Even the soldiers have lost their silly identities as being idiotic and are now just scary and stoic. When Armand comes back to rescue Leoni and DeGrignon is drunk with another soldier, it is almost jarring to go back to comedy so quickly.

My big problem was that I kept comparing this film to Marianne, which I reviewed earlier for this blog. While Devil-May-Care had better cinematography, Marianne had a much funnier script, and better songs. The songs in Devil-May-Care are mostly operatic, compared to the catchy jazz numbers in Marianne, and many numbers in Devil-May-Care are only a stanza or two as opposed to the full number. This would be fine if the full number would be done later in the film, but generally that is all we hear. I also felt like the film could have included more songs. On the other hand, the orchestrations are much fuller and sound more professional than other MGM musicals made up to this point. The studio was clearly getting better at prerecording and making musical numbers sound more professional. 

Home Video

Devil-May-Care comes to us as another Warner Archive DVD release, this time from 2015, being its sole home video release. In a November 2015 episode of the Warner Archive podcast (entitled Of Mirth and Men), George Feltenstein says this was a new remastering of the film, and it shows. The film was excellent in picture in sound quality for the most part. Of course, that made the few small sections that were lacking stick out a little bit more. The Napoleon prologue, mentioned earlier, has contrast and flickering issues, but these seem to clear up by the time the main action of the film begins during the execution scene. While scratches were minimal throughout the film, there were instances where there was some noticeable flickering in the source print. Additionally, in the climactic scene where the soldiers reveal to Leoni that the man she thinks is Charles is actually Armand, there were some noticeable scratches during this section. Again, nothing that can't be forgiven for a 1929 film. The film is mostly presented in a 1.37:1 aspect ratio, minus the opening MGM Lion logo, which is a 1.20:1 aspect ration. As with It's a Great Life and other films preceding it, Devil-May-Care had a Sound on Film and Sound on Disc version, and having these two different releases for the sound film contributed to the two different aspect ratios. Considering that the source was probably a print, it would explain why the aspect ratio is the cropped 1.37:1 version, minus the logo. 

For the color sequence, Feltenstein mentioned that a color nitrate print was found and utilized. I'm glad that this was found, but wish it had been better quality. I'm not sure if the quality was due to the limitations of the Process 3 two-strip Technicolor, a print that had deteriorated, or just a flawed print, but there was definitely some issues in the color sequence. The image was very overexposed, and there was a lot of grain (heavy grain being a problem with earlier Process 3 Technicolor films). Also, the colors were very orange.

The dialogue is crisp and easy to understand, which is surprising for a 1929 film, especially with the actors speaking with accents. There were only two instances where there were audio issues. The first is during the scene where Louise and Leoni are in bed talking about love. There is a lot of noise on the track in this section, which is a shame because it is a song section, and with a film that had so few songs I really wanted to enjoy this number. The second would be during the reprise of Ramon Novarro's number "Charming". The last note had a garbled jump in the audio that startled me. Overall, though, audiences can appreciate that this film is well preserved, thanks to the efforts of the Warner Archive.