Rose-Marie

Jeanette MacDonald is "Rose-Marie" in this 1936 film also starring Nelson Eddy, James Stewart and Allan Jones. The movie borrows its title from the Rudolf Friml operetta, but it does not use the plot or many of the songs. MacDonald plays a famous opera singer named Marie de Flor whose brother (Stewart), going by the last name of Flower, has escaped prison and killed a Mountie. She leaves at once for Quebec and winds up meeting - who else - Nelson Eddy, a Mountie who recognizes her immediately and believes at first that he is helping her get to a rendezvous with a man. Meanwhile, he's falling for her himself.

Nelson and Jeannette were one of the great screen teams, and even now, they have fans all over the world. Jeanette was beautiful, a good singer and a fine actress, and Nelson, while not being much of an actor, was an attractive man with a magnificent voice. Their big hit, in fact, their signature song, "Indian Love Call," is from this film, as is, naturally, "Rose-Marie." Because of the recording devices used back then and the way female singers were taught, Jeannette's lyric-coloratura suffers somewhat. Like all female singers of that era, she has a back placement for her high notes, though the middle part of her range is quite beautiful. Her obsession with Tosca - one of the opera scenes shown, and a role she also performed on stage in real life - is a curious one. She had no business singing it, and neither did the tenor, Allan Jones, who was a lyric tenor. It's for a dramatic soprano and a spinto tenor. The Gounod "Romeo et Juliette," which she sings with Jones in the beginning of the movie is much more appropriate for both of them. Eddy, on the other hand, had operatic roots, and his baritone has survived very well. They sounded wonderful together, and there was something about them that just worked, even if he was somewhat wooden. She was spitfire enough for both of them, and it made a nice contrast. My favorite part of the film is when, after her guide steals her money, Marie goes looking for the job as a singer in a honky tonk café and tries to do "Some of these Days," which she sings operatically while attempting to copy the hoochie-coochie movements of the café's resident singer.

Stewart was slowly ascending the scale to stardom, getting better and better roles - he has a couple of big scenes in this film. He's boyish, good-looking and very effective.

Today I suppose these films seem very campy, and they've surely been parodied over and over again. However, the music is enjoyable, Nelson and Jeanette are treasures, and one can't help but marvel, amidst the insanity of today, what a much simpler time it was. People were able to be lifted out of themselves for a little while with fantasy and beauty. These movies must have been doing something right. Seventy-plus years later, we're still enjoying them.

Yep, this is the most saccharine of all the films made by the 'singing sweethearts'. And its perfect. Despite the low production values evident in Nelson's 1st number in the film, The Mounties, it soon settles into a nice two hour wallow where Jeanette chirps through Juliet's love song, gets scared in the woods, and falls for the cutie mountie (but of course, who wouldn't after he sang the title tune so sweetly during a boat ride). Great stuff. Those of you expecting to see James Stewart though have a long wait as most of the time is spent trying to find him! And who could resist that timeless song 'when I'm calling you'? Sweet.

Forget the super-sweet aspects of this film. Forget the paper-thin storyline. To jump on this film using the standards that today's audience's exact is totally unfair. This film was released in 1936 when the US was in the midst of the Great Depression and people needed mind candy that was super-sugarcoated. But, before you ring off to surf some other site, listen the music created by two rather mediocre singers. Their voices create a sound that is incredible. They did again and again too. From their biographies written by their children who discovered their love letters long after both Eddy and MacDonald were dead, it seems that the love clinches were more earnest than mere acting. But, forget even that bit of gossip. Listen to the sound that these two made, in love with each other or not. It is something magic. And, fans, we just don't see much of that anymore.

Beautiful scenery provides a romantic backdrop for this musical love story. The role of a stout-hearted Canadian Mountie who "always gets his man"--and in this case, "his woman", too!--is ideal for Eddy, whose stiff mannerisms usually hold these MacDonald/Eddy vehicles back somewhat. As a "straight and true" type his stiffness becomes an asset. While MacDonald undresses in a tent, for example, this Mountie's mind is solely on his duty as he goes through every item of her clothes (as she peels them off) looking for the map that will tell him where his quarry is. It never once occurs to this over-sized boy scout that this beautiful woman is getting naked two feet away from him!

The opening half-hour or so is all Jeanette's and she is vibrant as a swell-headed prima donna whose every thought is of herself. MacDonald seems to really enjoy playing this caricature of a star. David Niven is barely discernible (he's not given one close-up) in his brief appearance as an unrequited suitor. His character goes from city to city to see Marie-- and to propose to her--only to be ushered to the door every time. There's also something deliciously wacky in the way Jeanette enchants everyone with her singing--they cluster around her the same way "100 Men" do around Universal's Deanna Durbin whenever she starts to sing.

But the heart of this romance is in the wilderness scenes, perched above the lakes and hills and beneath the stars, where it seems like time has stopped and all that exists are two lovers singing the echo-like "When I'm Calling You" number to one another. The story in this musical has a wonderful habit of dropping away--while the beautiful singing and orchestration draw these two hearts closer and closer until they finally kiss and profess their love. It doesn't get any cornier than this--but the rhythm of this movie is just right. The last scene with Eddy just standing there finally able to return the "call" he couldn't before is played perfectly--all in song.

The story has once again just dropped away and the two lovers are alone together again. There's a purity to this bonding that is hard to resist...

There have been three versions of Rose Marie done for the screen, a silent 1927 version and on in 1954 as well as this one. And not one of them had the same plot and not one of them repeated the same plot as the original stage version in 1923. Not that it matters because this version with Jeanette and Nelson sets the standard.

One thing I did object to is that a whole lot of the Rudolf Friml- Otto Harbach-Oscar Hammerstein II score was jettisoned. Some very nice songs were left out. Only The Mountie Song, Rose Marie, and Indian Love Call were retained. Totem Tom Tom which is done as a dance number actually has words. Because Jeanette is an opera singer in this one, arias from Tosca and Romeo and Juliet were included. And Friml and MGM house composer Herbert Stothart wrote a couple of other melodies with Gus Kahn doing lyrics. Nice, but not the real score.

In this version Jeanette is an opera singer who receives word in Montreal that her younger brother is a fugitive after killing a man. She goes to him, but on the way gets sidetracked by Mountie Nelson Eddy. He just happens to be the guy they've assigned to get the brother. I don't think I have to give any more of the plot away.

Jeanette and Nelson are in good voice and MGM splurged a little by going on location and not using any back lot sets to show the Canadian wilderness. I'm willing to bet that Rose Marie may have been the most expensive of their eight films to produce.

Three future stars got exposure in Rose Marie. Allan Jones who Jeanette would co-star with the following year in The Firefly sung the opera numbers with her. David Niven has a brief role as a stage door Johnny ready to declare his undying love for the diva. And James Stewart plays her fugitive younger brother.

Of course Jimmy Stewart was able to do this before he became typecast as all American good guy Jimmy Stewart. Three years later MGM could never have cast him this way. But his performance was definitely a big break for bigger and better roles.

Because of this film Nelson Eddy got his trademark. After he left films and concert singing and did nightclubs towards the end of his life, Nelson would always make a grand entrance replete in white tie, tuxedo, and a Mountie hat. Nelson Eddy was one of the kindest and most generous of performers in giving of himself to his public, but he least of all took his movie career image seriously. In fact he always maintained he was a singer first and film was just a medium to give his singing career more visibility.

But if you want to hear some golden voices doing some classic songs like they don't write any more than I can't recommend Rose Marie strongly enough.