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7 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :-
A triumph for all involved, 23 September 2001

Author: rsoonsa (rsoonsa@bandbbooks.com) from Mountain Mesa, California

FANNY is the second film of a trilogy, based upon a play by Marcel Pagnol, from which all three works are taken, featuring most of the cast of excellent actors which made the stage original a great artistic and popular success, including Raimu, Charpin, Pierre Fresnay, and Orane Demazis as Fanny, an assemblage which remains faithful to the heart of the original. By repudiating the normal placement of concurrent French films made in Parisian studios, and producing the work in his native Marseilles, in Provence, Pagnol achieves a finely-hewn naturalism which is very congenial to the scenario, dealing as it does with a hard-working bourgeoisie whose lives are in concert with rhythms of a major seaport. Fanny's passionate attention to Marius (Fresnay) results in her pregnancy from their farewell coupling at the denouement of the first of the trilogy, MARIUS, with her lover falling prey to the lure of a seafaring life and she, abandoned, accepts a proposal of marriage from a much older M. Panisse (Charpin), in order to save the reputation of her family. The love of Panisse for the child of Fanny is the moving force in what must be the inevitable fulfillment of the storyline, i.e., the return of Marius to claim his erstwhile fiancée and his true child in a scene which brings the best from Demazis, Fresnay, and Raimu as Cesar, the father of Marius and lifelong friend of Panisse. Pagnol directed only the finale of the trio, and selects for FANNY Marc Allegret, who leads the cast with distinction, displaying particular skill when allowing Pagnol's magnificent dialogue to be developed in what is essentially a filmed work for the stage, with few sets, and who allows liberal emphasis upon the plastic Raimu, who is, after all, the most important presence in this romantic masterpiece.

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4 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
good tear-jerker follow-up, 16 May 2006

Author: planktonrules from Bradenton, Florida

This is the second of the three part "Fanny Trilogy" by the French writer, Marcel Pagnol. Originally, they were a stage play, then a movie and then many years later in 1961, the three movies were combined to make one movie named FANNY. I've always loved the 1961 movie, so I was thrilled to see the original three movies--all part of a 4 disk set by Kino Video.

Throughout much of the 1932 movie, the lines were identical or very close to the 1961 film. Of the three movies, I think this one is closest to the 1961 film except that this one is in French with subtitles and is black and white. The 1961 version is simply a lot prettier--with great music, lighting, and acting. The earlier version, though wonderful, is a little more flat. Not bad--in fact, very good,...just kind of flat in comparison. If you only have the patience, see the 1961 combined film. If you are a cinephile, then see all of the films--the writing by Pagnol is amazing.

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1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
A sequel that doesn't live up to the first installment, 16 September 2007

Author: (richard@berrong.fr) from United States

I've watched this movie several times now, each time hoping I will like it more than the time before. But that doesn't happen. The first movie in the so-called Marseilles Trilogy, Marius (1931), is one of the masterpieces of world cinema, and not surprisingly one of the most beloved of French movies by the French. This movie, based on Pagnol's sequel play of the same name, has much more melodrama and much less humor than Marius, and frankly, the melodrama is not good melodrama (whatever that would be). The scene between Panisse and Fanny, when he explains why he will marry her even though she is pregnant by another man (Marius), is moving and funny. The final scene is interesting for the definition of fatherhood that it puts forward. There are interesting moments here and there throughout the movie. But the whole falls far short of Marius, and too often comes off as just another 1930s movie melodrama. If you liked Marius - and how could you not? - you would want to see this, but don't get your expectations up too high. More's the shame.

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2 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
She sells shellfish, 14 June 2004
Author: writers_reign

Part the Second of this trilogy reminds us that at heart it is pure melodrama and if not quite 'dead! and never called me mother', it is certainly from the same stable. Arguably Orane Demazis - replicating here, as indeed are all the principals, her stage role as the eponymous seduced and abandoned and slightly enceinte ingenue - is the weakest link in an unusually strong chain yet even then with the handicap of being saddled with a role that today would be risible (I doubt if it is possible to 'SPOIL' a classic which is now some 72 years old so suffice it to say that as a result of 'giving herself' to Marius, shortly before he ships out on an extended cruise, Fanny finds herself in an 'interesting' position and must make some tough choices. Today, of course, it is practically an honor to fall pregnant with no father material in sight and a State standing by to cosset the resulting infant from cradle to grave but in 1932 the resulting 'shame' embraced not only the mother-to-be but also her family) she manages to elicit our compassion and keep our humor at bay. Pedants will have a field day with the dodgy arithmetic - Marius has supposedly signed up for a five-year voyage yet on his return Fanny's son is a mere 10 months old - but what matters is the acting-plus-believability factor and here, thanks as always to the great Raimu, aided and abetted by Fernand Charpin, Alida Rouffe and Milly Mathis they bring it off to a fare-thee-well. Pierre Fresnay as Marius does little more than play the fly-in-the-ointment in the closing quarter of the movie and may well have been looking ahead one full decade to 'Le Corbeau'. Building on the first part and moving seamlessly to the next stage this is a worthy successor to 'Marius'. 9/10

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1 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Feels like a filmed stage play, 7 November 2005

Author: raskimono

I have just finished watching Proof, a film released in the year of our Lord, 2005, which is adapted from a stage play in which the director has gone to great pains to hide the fact that his work is based on the play. flash back 70 years and we have a movie made that looks like a filmed stage play with real locations replacing the stage sets. All early sound movies feel set-locked as people talk and deliver within the range of the camera. Therefore, to hold the interest to the modern viewer, the dialogue and acting must be believable and engaging. The film fails to achieve it for the most part because the performance of the actress playing Fanny is a total success even though she was reprising her role from the stage. First time director, Pagnol adapting his own stage works suffers from a non-visual eye. The delight, is French star Raimu who delivers a performance still worthy to the eye even today. There is a reason Orson Welles called him a genius. The melodramatic plot of a scorned, (maybe that is too strong a word: even abandoned is too strong because she never lets on to her man that she does not want him to leave) woman who is pregnant is passé though common in the literature of the period. I remember a tracking shot that impressed me as the camera follows Fanny through the streets as she suspects she is pregnant. In the way it is handled and executed, it is cinematic authorship at its finest. It is a film in the middle of the trilogy, therefore there are loose ends left to be resolved. All movies are time capsules, it is said, therefore approach this with the right attitude and you might be rewarded.

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