Wedding March (film)

Erich von Stroheim began work on the new plan immediately after his transition from Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer to Paramount ; in April 1926, he completed the 154-page script; however, the well-known version of the film covers only the first 67: due to its length, the film was divided into two parts (of which each, in turn, was also reduced) - “Wedding March” and “ The Honeymoon ” ^[1] but the second part of the dilogy is considered lost: a copy of the film, burned down in France in 1957, was supposedly the only one ^[2] . In the director’s concept, the name “Wedding March” refers to the whole story: at the very beginning, her hero Stroheim promised her mother that soon she would hear the wedding march, in the finale - bravura military music became his “wedding march”, and church organ - “wedding march” his beloved ^[3] .

Since for Stroheim himself many of the producers ’demands were unacceptable, films were cut by other directors, including Joseph von Sternberg . Already in the 50s, Stroheim was able to partially restore the original version of the "Wedding March" ^[4] .

The film, which the director devoted to “all truly loving,” partially embodied real memories of youth in his native Vienna , but to an even greater extent - “dreams” of Stroheim, because his main character, a cavalry officer and aristocrat, is exactly who Stroheim composing his biography, he wanted to be, but never was.

He didn’t like working with “stars” (although many actors played star roles in his films), Stroheim in his seventh film invited mostly artists he knew well: he had already worked with Seizu Pitts for greed , with Maud George collaborated constantly, starting with his second film, “The Skeleton Key of the Devil” (1920), and only in “Greed” there was no suitable role for her; Cesare Gravina starred in Stroheim in Stupid Wives (1922), Carousel, and Greed, and Dale Fuller in all films starting Stupid Wives. Stroheim himself, who excelled in the roles of small and larger villains, both in strangers and in his own early films, first played a hero who, for all his ambiguity, does not deserve this title.

In some episodes of the film, the two-color (red-green) Technicolor process was used.

Vienna 1914 . Prince Nicholas von Wildelibe-Rauffenburg, or simply Nikki, the offspring of an impoverished aristocratic family, a fan of pretty women who does not ignore the maids - everyone who is in the house serves in the imperial cavalry regiment and is constantly in straitened circumstances. Once again he lost the cards, asks for help from his father, the general, but a loving father advises him to shoot himself. Or marry money. The mocking mother advises Nikki to forget about poker and passionate girlfriends. Or marry money. Nikki chooses the last option and in exchange for a promise to marry it is profitable to get paid soon.

During the parade, he notices a pretty girl, Mitzi Schrammel, daughter of a violinist, in a crowd of spectators. Their long exchange of looks, smiles, gestures is less and less like a flirt on duty, but suddenly a horse near Nikki, frightened by a salute, rushes forward and knocks Mitzi down. A girl with serious injuries is sent to the hospital. The witness is what happened to her fiancé - the uncouth butcher Shani Erble, with whom Mitzi became engaged to by her mother’s will (his father owns a vineyard in a suburb of Vienna with a small restaurant, and for Mitzi he is considered a profitable party); in righteous anger he pounced on the unlucky boyfriend, for which he was immediately arrested.

Nikki visits the girl in the hospital, and then finds in Erble Senior, the Vineyard, an open-air restaurant in the middle of the garden where Mitzi plays the harp (and her father plays the violin); perhaps he falls in love for the first time in his life, meanwhile his parents are looking for his bride and choose the daughter of the wealthy industrialist Fortunat Schweiser, not very beautiful, lame, but with a dowry of 20 million. Nikki’s attempt to evade - on the grounds that he is in love - amuses his parents: in his years it was time to know that marriage was one thing and love was another.

Shani Erble, coming out of prison, learns about the relationship of his bride with the prince and, not without gloating, brings her a newspaper with a message about Nikki's upcoming wedding. But this marriage does not return the bride to the butcher: Mitzi still refuses him.

On the wedding day, Erble arrives at the church with the intention of shooting an opponent; Mitzi, in order to stop the butcher, promises to marry him. Without even knowing what threat the girl took away from him, Nikki with his young wife leaves the church, gets into the carriage and leaves.

• So ends the first part of the dilogy.

Honeymoon

Nikki and Cecilia spend their honeymoon in the Alps ; Mitzi marries a hated butcher; none of the four feels happy: smart, subtle Cecilia painfully loves her husband, but knows that he married for the money; knows about his relationship with Mitzi and sees that the memories of the abandoned girl do not leave him; Shani Erble, unable to achieve reciprocity from his wife, again decides to kill an opponent who ruined his life. But he doesn’t kill; instead, he seriously injures Cecilia.

The doctor informs Nikki that Cecilia’s spine is damaged and “reassures”: she will live another fifty years if she lies still. Cecilia also knows what life awaits her; Mitzi visits an unlucky rival and, feeling guilty in front of her, asks Nikki to be especially attentive to his wife. At night, in the room next to Cecilia’s bedroom, Nikki innocently pours out her pain to her sister of mercy: “Fifty years old, she will grow old, and I will grow old!” Cecilia hears this and “releases” her husband.

Shani Erble on the run, Mitzi returns to her parents, but a conflict with her mother forces her to leave the house, along with her sympathetic father. The widowed Nikki also returns to her parents; it seems to him that he managed to fall in love with Cecilia. “You are very old,” the mother notes and throws her son into shock with a cynical statement: “Your marriage turned out to be exceptionally profitable!” ^[5]

Continued at Stroheim

Mitzi, leaving the city, says goodbye to the “Vineyard”; it takes about two months, at the end of July, Nikki comes to Vineyard, “No Mitzi, the Garden of Eden is desolate. Later, from the old Shrammel, he learns that Mitzi got her hair cut as a nun, and visits her at the monastery. But Mitzi does not want to leave the monastery: she found her place.

July 28 comes, Franz Joseph declares war on Serbia , and Nikki voluntarily goes to the army. The parade before being sent to the front is on the same square in front of St. Stephen's Cathedral , where Nikki and Mitzi first met. In the cathedral, a young nun in white clothes plays the organ - this is Mitzi ^[6] .

• This part of the script was not included in the film.

Honeymoon Final

The film, shortened by the will of the studio management, ended with a scene in the house of Wildelibe-Rauffenburg: the respectable family discussed their financial successes (to the mother’s question about what condition he now has, Nikki replied: “I have not yet studied the loot , mother”); it was reported that Shanni was killed, and Mitzi went to the monastery ^[7] .

• Erich von Stroheim - Prince Nicholas von Wildelibe-Rauffenburg (Nikki)
• Fay Ray - Mitzer Schrammel (Mitzi)
• Matthew Betz - Shani Erble, the Butcher
• George Nicholas - Fortunat Schweiser, Industrialist
• Seizu Pitts - Cecilia Schweiser, his daughter
• George Fawcett - Prince Ottokar, Nikki's Father
• Maud George - Princess Mary, Nikki's mother
• Dale Fuller - Katerina Schrammel, Mitzi's mother
• Cesare Gravina - Martin Schrammel, Mitzi's father

• Erich von Stroheim - Director and Scriptwriter
• Harry Car - screenwriter
• Roy H. Claffy - Cameraman
• Ray Rennahan - Technicolor
• John Stepan the Wonder - composer

• Arthur Lennig. Stroheim. - Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2000 .-- ISBN 0-8131-2138-8 . (eng.)
• Herman G. Weinberg. Stroheim: a pictorial record of his nine films. - NY: Dover Publications, 1975 .-- ISBN 0-4862-2723-5 . (eng.)