Joshua Logan had a storied stage career, the highlights of which are probably his direction of "Annie Get Your Gun," and his multi-tasking on the Pulitzer Prize winning "South Pacific." As a film director his oeuvre is considerably more spotty, with a couple of well-regarded non-musicals like Bus Stop and Picnic to his credit interspersed with gigantic musicals like Camelot and Paint Your Wagon. While his film of South Pacific was an extraordinary box office success, its artistic merits are still debated hotly to this day, including its use of color filters and even the casting of Mitzi Gaynor (a lot of fans argue Doris Day would have been the perfect Nellie, and a much bigger box office draw, to boot). Fanny falls somewhere in between these putatively smaller films and the bloated musicals which capped Logan's screen career. With a principal cast of four--Caron as Fanny, Horst Buccholz as Marius, Maurice Chevalier as Panisse, and Oscar nominated Charles Boyer as Cesar--Fanny has the intimate feel of a character piece, but Logan's often ham handed directorial choices keep trying to make it larger than it should be, to often deleterious effect.

Working with legendary cinematographer Jack Cardiff, Logan captures a lot of the feel, and certainly the look, of beautiful Marseilles. Location footage is used to glorious effect, and even the rear screen projection shots look relatively marvelous. Some of the pre-Steadicam aerial work leaves a bit to be desired, but there are stunning visuals throughout Fanny that frequently make it a wonder to behold. What undercuts this visual splendor is Logan's strange directorial choices, including a lot of unneeded extreme close-ups of his actors (something he repeated in Camelot), and continuity-breaking editing choices, where one through-line is suddenly interrupted by a quick (and needless) cutaway to one of the other characters. The film also boasts a beautiful (if at times overused) underscore, supervised by Harry Sukman, based on Rome's songs for the musical version. It's something of a parlor game for musical theater fans to watch Fanny and try to note (no pun intended) where certain songs from the musical are being used, or hinted at, in the dramatic underscore.

All of the performances are superb (with the possible exception of Georgette Anys as Fanny's mother, who appears to have been quite poorly dubbed, robbing her performance of a lot of its visual expressiveness). Caron emerges here in a post-gamine guise, with longer, lighter hair, and a womanly air that was only hinted at in the finale of Gigi. Buccholz, who reminded me in this role of a sort of cross between Dean Stockwell and Montgomery Clift, has searing good looks and an intense delivery that bring Marius' desire to escape the supposedly stifling confines of Marseilles to life. But the film largely belongs to Chevalier and Boyer, two French legends who work beautifully together here. Chevalier has never been sweeter or more lovable, and Boyer does a fine job delineating a basically good man who buries his disappointment under layers of anger and bluster.

Too long by probably a half hour or so, Fanny does deliver its emotional goods in the final scenes, when Marius' reunion with his young son starts a chain of events leading to the final denouement. Caron and Chevalier are especially effective in these final scenes, as Caron realizes how selfish she has been in the light of Chevalier's selflessness. The film does seem to end abruptly with a sort of strange shot of a Commedia dell'Arte clad clown doing backflips on a trampoline, which I guess is Logan's shorthand for "all's well that ends well," though it seems somewhat sanguine in the face of all the misery and drama that has just preceded it.

Fanny, despite receiving five Oscar nominations in 1961 (including Best Picture), is a mixed bag at best, as a lot of Logan's films are. Beautiful to watch and listen to, with some excellent performances, it's still overblown and tries to sustain more of an operatic tone than its small scale, intimate character study roots can support. While the film deals surprisingly frankly (and with a typically Gallic shrug of the shoulders) with illegitimacy, it may leave some viewers similarly shrugging, wondering what all the fuss was ultimately about.

The DVD

Video:
Fanny is presented in an enhanced 1.85:1 aspect ratio, in a transfer that is generally excellent. Technicolor by the 1960s just wasn't what it used to be, so temper your expectations accordingly. This particular transfer seems to be a bit on the yellow side. Don't let the opening credits sequence scare you--it has quite a bit of scratching and other debris, but once the actual film starts, the print is surprisingly sharp and problem free.

Sound:
Two audio options are offered, DD mono and 5.1. You may actually prefer the original mono mix for this film--the 5.1 makes the dubbing issues too apparent. Evidently a lot of the location outdoor footage was looped later, and the reverb difference on the voices is only too obvious.

Extras:
Image did fans a favor by including a bonus CD of the beautiful soundtrack to this film. On the DVD is also the original trailer (in 1.33:1, strangely), featuring some nice moments with Chevalier and Boyer.

Final Thoughts:
If you're a fan of musicals, Fanny, despite being shorn of its songs, is recommended. Most other viewers will find enough to enjoy here to make this a nice evening's rental.

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"G-d made stars galore" & "Hey, what kind of a crappy fortune is this?" ZMK, modern prophet