La marcha nupcial

Prince Nicki (Erich von Stroheim), a young aristocrat in financial troubles who mostly likes to spend on women and gambling. His parents refuse to give him any more money and tell him to marry some rich woman. Nicki agrees. While his parents are on the lookout for a potential wife, Nicki meets Mitzi (Fay Wray). They secretly start courting behind the back of their parents, and her rude fiance. Meanwhile, a wealthy factory owner Scweisser makes an offer to Nicki's father - Nicki must marry his daughter Cecelia (Zasu Pitts), with a heavy limp.

Sounds like a simple royal love affair? Well, it's von Stroheim - there are plenty more.

The shooting of 'The Wedding March' was halted by the studio because von Stroheim spent too much money and time on elaborate sets and reshooting scenes. Again. The film was cut together from the footage he had already shot. This is probably the reason why the story moves forward much faster in the second half of the movie. Zasu Pitts's screen time is quite limited, but she manages to make a lasting effect even with the little time she has. Erich von Stroheim usually shines as sinister types, but here he proves that he can pull off quite charming and sympathetic characters as well. True stars in this one (besides von Stroheim's directorial genius) are Fay Wray as Mitzi and Matthew Betz as her fiance Schani.

'The Wedding March' is not the masterpiece it could have been, but it stands as just another testament of Erich von Stroheim's talents.

Leaving MGM (and Irving Thalberg) behind and joining Paramount, Erich von Stroheim worked with his co-writer Harry Carr to come up with a tale set in Stroheim's native Vienna, a tale as large and expansive as anything he had told. The production ran on for nine months after having essentially recreated a large section of 1914 Vienna on the Paramount backlot until the studio shut down production and forced Stroheim to cut a film with what he had. He ended up producing two films, The Wedding March and its now lost sequel The Honeymoon, and the first half (well, perhaps the first third, there was apparently talk of a third entry) feels truncated. The films were also victims of the transition to sound, getting left behind in the mad dash for talkies that Paramount was obviously not willing to give money to Stroheim to reshoot in order to accomplish. The end result is a nice film with a surprisingly hard edged finale that really feels like it was going to feed into something more but manages to stand well enough on its own.

Prince Nicki (Stroheim) is the only son of an old Viennese family that is running low on funds. He spends his nights pursuing expensive women and gambling, getting himself into financial holes that his father, Prince Ottokar (George Fawcett), refuses to help with the problem while his mother, Princess Maria (Maude George), helps him paper over the problems, but she extracts from him a promise that he will marry money, a woman of her choosing. He happily accepts, and in the tradition of these sorts of romantic operettas, Nicki instantly discovers the woman he actually loves, a common girl named Mitzi (Fay Wray), the daughter of an innkeeper who is purportedly betrothed to Schani (Matthew Betz), a butcher.

The movie is built out of extended sequences, the first of which is really where Nicki meets Mitzi, and it's where the film is at its most charming. Nicki is part of a military parade on Corpus Christi, stationed to the side as the Emperor Franz-Josef enters the cathedral. Nicki and Mitzi catch each other's eyes, and it's just a series of small, playful bits of mostly wordless banter between the two as things happen around them, mostly Mitzi's father (Cesare Gravina) and mother (Dale Fuller) engage with Schani, notice the flirting going on between their daughter and the notorious, penniless womanizer on the horse and in the uniform above them.

The romance between the two grows around a late night meeting where Nicki visits Mitzi at her window, taking her out to look at the beautiful Blue Danube River, but this happens while Prince Ottokar meets with the rich industrialist Fortunat Schweisser (George Nichols) to arrange the marriage of Nicki to Schweisser's daughter Cecelia (ZaSu Pitts). I mean...it was kind of predictable that Nicki's parents would figure out a less than ideal match (Cecelia has a limp) just when Nicki finds true love. It really is that kind of movie.

What this doesn't seem to be is the kind of movie where Nicki marries Cecelia, leaving Mitzi alone to try and save Nicki's life because Schani is so mad at what's going on that even though Nicki's marrying another woman, Schani can't take the shame and is planning on murdering Nicki as he walks out of his own wedding. This is either the most cynical ending of Stroheim's career outside of Greed, or it's essentially the second act turn that was going to get resolved in further story that probably would have been captured in The Honeymoon.

It's a largely nice look at Vienna in 1914, at ill-fated romance, and with a not entirely expected ending that sends our loving characters in vastly different directions. I wish The Honeymoon still existed in order to see how the story resolved (I imagine it's pretty standard romantic stuff and Nicki and Mitzi end up together), but this does feel like half of a story instead of something entirely completely. Still, the production design is impeccable (one of the film's cameramen got married on the set of the cathedral), enough so that when it was complete Stroheim reportedly declared that he was standing in the Vienna of his youth. The acting is good all around, and the romance is solidly built. Without the second half of the story, it feels like a trifle with an unexpected ending. Still, it's nice.

Von Stroheim stars as Austrian nobleman Nickolas von Wildeliebe-Rauffenberg. His family wants him to marry Cecelia Schweisser (Zasu Pitts), the crippled daughter of a wealthy business magnate. But Nicki meets the beautiful Mitzi (Fay Wray), a farm girl and harp player of low birth. Mitzi is being pursued by the loutish butcher Schani (Matthew Betz), but her heart pines for the dashing Nicki. Can their love survive the pullback from society?

Stroheim lavishes the screen with ornate costumes and settings that threaten to overwhelm the meager narrative. There's even a lengthy Technicolor segment showing a parade full of pomp and majesty. Wray is very good, sensual yet innocent at the same time. Pitts also manages to elicit pathos from a role that could easily have been a one-note villain. Stroheim encountered his usual post-production problems, and multiple editors were brought in to work on the film, including Josef von Sternberg. Some consider this a masterpiece, whereas I found it good, though not exceptionally so.

A sweet, sweet film full of apple blossoms, parades, and Miss Wray's delight at being bought a box of chocolates ... absolutely wonderful ... despite Nicki and Mitzi being perhaps the oddest odd couple you could find, it somehow works. Lingers in the mind a long time after viewing. Highly recommended.

Erich Von Stroheim is known for his iron-clad grip on his productions. "The Wedding March" is no exception. But his desire for perfection is one reason this movie is so wonderful. For those of you who only know him as Max von Mayerling in "Sunset Blvd." and Fay Wray as King Kong's "girlfriend", you need to do yourself a favor and watch this movie. It's touchingly beautiful and doesn't end quite the way you'd think it would.