Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love

In some ways this film can be seen as an extended victim impact report. It is about Marianne who clearly contributed much to Cohens life on more than one level.

It also leaves a great deal unsaid and hazy. The assumption is that the cultural moments of the day ( and the copious drugs) have blurred the stories in many many ways. Despite all of that it somehow brings the back story of Marianne and Leonard into focus in a very sweet way towards the end of the film.

A number of the interviewees are just plain great. Watch out forAviva Layton who seems to be uncredited but she deserves better.

In many ways this film could have been much better if we had got past the headlines. Archival footage is used but the viewpoint most of the time is very much the male point of view.

This much thoughtless behaviour seems highly paradoxical. The myth of the unreachable poet seems to have attracted considerable numbers of women to the Cohen fan club. They felt like they were being understood. But seems to me; if that were really true - the story would have turned out quite differently.

What lifts this film is the redemption towards the end when we see the famous letter from Leonard to Marianne. In his dying moments Leonard recognised the value of his connection with Marianne. Coverage of the 5 or 6 years in a Buddhist monastery definitely hints at a rebalancing of Cohens' personal life and perspectives.

All in all this is a rather gentle sideways look at a significant relationship but understandably it is overbalanced by the the celebrity aspects of the story.

Marianne herself is present in the story but mostly in a back handed compliment kind of way.

If you are familiar with Canadian Leonard Cohen's work, you'll recognize the deep voice singing lyrics of poetic joy and lamentations mostly about women in his life. Such is also the spirit of the informative and moving documentary Marianne and Leonard: Words of Love, both joyful like his megahit Halleluiah and woeful like his song of goodbye to his muse Marianne, a Norwegian beauty capable of inspiring transcendent music.

A woman in my theater row disclosed that the two concerts of Leonard she saw were a religious experience. Indeed, here was a poet and songster who exuded a prayerful love of life and inspirational muses like Marianne and Suzanne. That he spent six of his last years in a monastery is no surprise, nor that during that Buddhist time he lost his fortune to a "friend" who embezzled it all.

Love and loss fueled his '60's persona that with his poetic writing and dark good looks magnetized women to the extent that the endless supply of supplicants seemed to energize and inspire him rather than laying low ordinary men with the excess. This doc is about the beginning of his career with Judy Collins introducing him as a singer rather than just a composer who lived with Marianne on the idyllic Greek isle Hydra.

Although director and close Marianne friend Nick Broomfield stays out of the lovers' way, he loses some power in the multiple vignettes that sometimes feel isolated rather than fluid. Nor does the director allow more than just snippets from memorable songs such as Suzanne, Goodbye Marianne, Halleluiah, and Bird on a Wire, which are my favorites. In truth, this estimable doc is about Leonard's love life rather than his songs anyway.

I miss this unique troubadour, and you will too after hearing him again and living for a short while with his inspirations.

This is about a very special relationship over many years, and will certainly appeal to aficionados of Leonard Cohen. The story is well told and you will probably shed a tear at the end. If you enjoy the music and verse of Leonard Cohen then this is a film for you.

A lightweight, breezy documentary about one of the many relationships Leonard Cohen had with several beautiful women. As correctly described in the documentary, Cohen was not an easy person and wasn't after a "normal life" of getting married and spending life with the same woman.

The titular Marianne was a complex personality in her own right, already married with a child when she met Cohen and lived with him on an off for several years in what was an open relationship on both sides.

Some complained about Marianne not having been fleshed out because Cohen was a famous poet and songwriter, hence more important. From my point of view, whatever artistic aspirations Marianne might have had, it never developed into any worthy works. Not because anybody prevented her from "creating", but because of her own free will she went back to Norway at the end of the story and worked in an office for the rest of her life.

It's certainly not up to the audience to judge what sort of relationship Marianne and Leonard should have had. For sure, it was something that lasted until the end of their lives (very moving message sent by Cohen to the dying Marianne) and who's to say that it wasn't perhaps the most perfect relationship ever?

"Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love" (2019 release; 102 min.) is a documentary about the (in)famous relationship between singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen and Norwegian muse Marianne Ihlen. As the movie opens, we are "July 28, 2016" and the BBC informs us that Marianne has passed away. We then go to the "1970 Isle of Wright" festival, where Cohen asks the massive crowd "Marianne, are you there? Where are you, Marianne?" We then go to the early 60s in Hydra, Greece, where Marianne was living and Leonard, a struggling writer, has just arrived, and they meet by chance.... At this point we are 10 min. into the documentary.

Couple of comments: this is the latest documentary from director Nick Broomfield, best known for his "Kurt & Courtney" documentary in the late 90s. Here he delves into the long relationship between Leonard Cohen and Marianne Ihlen, who became Leonard's lover and muse. As a life-long fan of Leonard Cohen, I knew of Marianne vaguely (of course through the song "So Long, Marianne") and knew of their relationship but really nothing more than that. So this documentary was quite revealing in many ways. I was amazed at all of the archive footage that was unearthed from the 60s and 70s that paint such a vivid picture of that era (including footage from Broomfield himself and from D.A. Pennebaker, among others). We hear from Marianne (mostly through Norwegian interviews) and Leonard themselves extensively, but others comment as well (check out Judy Collins and, even better, the extensive comments from Ron Cornelius, Cohen's band mate who sounds remarkably like Bill Clinton). Please note: this is NOT a bio-documentary of Leonard Cohen. Hence, while there are some music and performance clips, they are clearly secondary only. The focus of the film is the long and complicated relationship/friendship between Marianne and Leonard. The last 10 min. of the film are a true emotional gut punch (as we know all along that these two passed away just months apart in 2016).

"Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love" opened out of the blue this weekend at my local art-house theater here in Cincinnati, and I immediately just had to go see it. The Friday early evening screening where I saw this at was not attended well (exactly 5 people in total). I have no idea how an "average" viewer might watch this documentary, but as a life-long fan of Cohen, I thought this documentary was just lovely from start to finish. (I saw Cohen in concert only 1 time, at the 2009 Coachella music fest, and what an unforgettable set that was.) If you are a Leonard Cohen fan and always have been curious about that mysterious Marianne from "So Lone, Marianne", I'd readily suggest you check this out, be it in the theater, on VOD, or eventually on DVD/Blu-ray, and draw your own conclusion.