The Wedding Night

Nothing gets a woman's heart pumping a little quicker than an early Gary Cooper movie, and The Wedding Night from 1935 is no exception.

Cooper is writer Tony Barratt - think F. Scott Fitzgerald - whose publisher doesn't want his next book and tells him whatever he had, he's lost it. So he and his wife Dora (Helen Vinson) take off for an inherited country home.

Tony becomes intrigued by the family of Polish émigrés who live nearby, particularly the beautiful daughter, Manya Novak (Sten).

Okay, here is something that confuses me. My friends are of Polish descent. They called their sister Mary Manya. So far, so good.

This family's last name is Novak. That's Czech.

And they say Dasvidaniya, which is Russian. Go figure.

Back to the story. After the father (Sig Ruman) buys a field from Tony for $5,000, Dora wants to hightail it back to New York, now that they have some money. Tony decides to stay. He begins writing a book about the family.

He and Manya fall in love, though it's unconsummated. She is engaged to Fredrik Sobieski (Ralph Bellamy) a real bumpkin, whom she doesn't love. When she decides not to marry him, her father has a fit, and the engagement is back on. Meanwhile, Tony wants a divorce.

Bittersweet film with lovely performances by Cooper and Sten. Cooper in the beginning is immaculate in a suit, and he and Dora are part of the high-class social set. He did play many sophisticated roles in the '30s, but Mr. Deeds and westerns would follow. Instead of strong and silent, here he's animated and romantic.

This film was apparently supposed to introduce Anna Sten to American audiences. Sam Goldwyn wanted to build her up as the next Garbo. I don't know about you, but I don't remember Greta Garbo playing a farmer with dowdy clothes. If he was going to build her up, why not showcase her beauty? She was beautiful, and her acting is very good. To me she hasn't the presence of Garbo or Dietrich, but I think Goldwyn could have given her better treatment.

Helen Vinson really has the strongest role, and she was up to it.

Very poignant story, directed by King Vidor, and beautifully photographed.

Yesterday I re-watched "The Wedding Night" (1935), this time with my wife who had never seen it before. For me it was like watching it all over again for the first time. I think that this happens with great pictures, like this one. She also loved the film and I felt so gratified by that, because sadly this type of quiet, sensitive films is not the kind of film which you can watch with anybody and can be fully appreciated as it should be.

I'm a fan of "the Gary Cooper" of the late '20s and 1930s, in my opinion some his best films were made around this time, before his definitive screen persona was established, especially in the early thirties. He gives a sensitive, balanced, nuanced, performance in a film that looks like a slice of life. His character is so unarchetypical, so honestly portrayed by him, that you get immersed totally in this beautiful love story. And this is no by chance, because the film was directed by the masterful King Vidor.

Praise must also go to the two actresses that vividly portray the two women in Cooper's life: the unjustly forgotten and underrated Russian actress Anna Sten and the equally unfairly forgotten actress Helen Vinson. Miss Vinson portrays without falling in the caricature, a shallow, but at the same time likable society woman, who thinks that life is a never-ending party and does not take marriage as seriously as it should be taken, realizing it too late. Miss Sten plays the naïve but strong-willed Polish woman who reluctantly at first, begins to fall for the writer portrayed by Cooper. The scene in which Cooper reads to her the first chapters of the new (autobiographical) book he is writing, is most telling in this aspect; because Miss Sten does not fall for the dashing, tall, handsome Cooper, but for his character's sensitiveness, feelings and emotions which she apprehends by means of this book in progress.

In short, none of the three principals of this story incur in stereotypical portrayals, which helped me to connect with their characters' emotions, with its virtues and flaws.

A wonderful experience, which with no doubt I'll repeat in the future, because this film deserves many viewings and is just my kind of film; a simple love story, unpretentiously directed, that does not aim at over sentimentality and does not fall into the maudlin which can ruin a movie, with superb, unaffected performances by the leads.

In New York, the writer Tony Barrett (Gary Cooper) was successful in his first novel. Now he is alcoholic and his two next books were failures. His publisher refuses to publish his last novel and the totally broken Tony is forced to move with his wife Dora (Helen Vinson) to the countryside of Connecticut to his family farmhouse. On the arrival, his neighbors Mr. Jan Novak (Siegfried Rumann) and his daughter Manya (Anna Sten) offer five thousand dollars for his idle lands. Tony accepts the offer and Dora decides to return to New York. Tony stays with his servant Taka and has dinner with the Novak family to close the business. When Taka decides to return to New York, Manya helps Tony with the housekeeping. They become close to each other and soon they fall in love with each other. But Tony is a married man and Manya is engaged to Fredrik Sobieski (Ralph Bellamy) in an arranged marriage. What will happen to their love?

"The Wedding Night" is a sad and tragic romance directed by King Vidor, who was a specialist in melodramas. The timeless love story is believable and engaging and has a heartbreaking conclusion. Based on the number of voters (553) and reviews (20), "The Wedding Night" is an unknown romance and the User Rating (6.8) is underrated. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "A Noite Nupcial" ("The Wedding Night")

Tony is a writer and can't get his latest book published in NYC so he and his wife go to a farmhouse he inherited in Connecticut where it'll be cheaper to live. While in Connecticut, he meets his Polish neighbors and their daughter, Manja. While Tony's wife is away and his cook has left him in the dead of winter, Manja helps Tony around the house and provides inspiration for his latest book. An attraction grows stronger, but Manja's hand in marriage is promised to a local farmer. Can two people promised to others and from very different worlds be happy? How will the book end? Film focuses strongly on Tony and Manja, but could have rounded out the wife's character a bit more - overall an enjoyable film but the ending's a bit melodramatic as most were for the time.

Heavy handed dour drama was the last of the big budget films to try and turn Anna Sten, Goldwyn's Folly, into another Garbo. The mistake of that was the actress while not bad, a little overfond of popping her eyes but otherwise fine, isn't suited to that persona. Had they pursued a lighter image for her which she seems inclined to perhaps her career would have fared better in American films. Poor Ralph Bellamy, usually an enjoyable presence in pictures, is made ridiculous by his silly casting as a Polish peasant. Cooper fares better mostly because an accent is not forced upon him and his star power is able to shine through. The person who comes across best even though her character is not the most pleasant is Helen Vinson as Cooper's estranged wife. It is at times confusing since she and Sten bear a strong resemblance to each other a fact not played up in the movie and so it serves no purpose but to distract the audience.