NFR Project: 'Grand Hotel' (1932)

 

NFR Project: ‘Grand Hotel’

Dir: Edmund Goulding

Scr: William A. Drake

Pho: William H. Daniels

Ed: Blanche Sewell

Premiere: April 12, 1932

112 min.

“Grand Hotel . . . always the same. People come, people go. Nothing ever happens.”

So says the disfigured doctor, the cynical Otternschlag (Lewis Stone), at both the beginning and end of this movie. In fact, the film tells us, there is very much going on in this Berlin hotel, much of it life-changing.

This is one of the earliest “all-star” films, large ensemble works that showcase many big-name actors. Here the cast consists of John Barrymore as the impoverished Baron Geigern, his brother Lionel as the timid accountant Kringelein, Wallace Beery as the industrialist Preysing, Joan Crawford as Flaemmchen the stenographer who dreams of bigger things, and Greta Garbo as the prima ballerina Grusinskaya, whose best days are behind her.

This is not merely stunt casting. Each of the five main actors has a complex character to play, each is necessary to move the plot forward.

These five peoples’ fates will intertwine. The Baron, who’s a gambler and a sneak thief, befriends Kringelein, an accountant who has a fatal illness and plans to blow all his money in a stay at the Grand Hotel. Meanwhile, Preysing is trying to close a big business deal, and Flaemmchen is his secretary.

The Baron goes the Grusinskaya’s room to steal her pearls, but he is caught when she returns form the theater, distraught because she feels no longer able to dance. “I vant to be alone,” she tells her followers, memorably and miserably. Fortunately for her, the Baron makes himself known when she is on the verge of suicide, and the two fall in love.

The Baron swears to join her in Vienna, but refuses to take any money from her to leave town with. He has the chance to steal what he needs from Kringelein, but relents. Preysing, whose deal is falling apart, plans to go to England to fix things, finds the Baron in his room stealing, and in a rage kills him.

Grusinskaya leaves the hotel for the train to Vienna, not knowing the Baron is dead. Preysing is hauled off by the police. Kringellein and Flaemmchen leave together, to seek a cure for his illness.

The key to the success of the picture is its admirable use of strong source material. In this case, it was the 1929 novel by the prolific and popular Vicki Baum. Producer Irving Thalberg bought the rights to the book right away, then had it adapted into a play, written by William A. Drake. This 1930 Broadway version of the book was a success, running for over a year. (It was also made into a Tony Award-winning musical in 1989.)

The director, Goulding, was not overawed by his stars, and he summoned fine performances from all of them (the film won Best Picture at the Oscars). The art direction by Cedric Gibbons is superb, and William H. Daniels’ cinematography is a dazzling spectrum of gradations of silver. Whoever thinks of “black-and-white” film as just that should watch Grand Hotel.

Goulding keeps the actors moving, a priority in what might easily have been merely a “talkie” film. With daring close-ups, traveling two-shots, sweeps, and pans, the camera follows the performers around like a curious inquisitor.

John Barrymore is outstanding in what would become one of his best remembered roles, a debonair, devil-may-care patrician. Lionel Barrymore has a whale of a time as the mouse turned man Kringelein. Beery does well with the brutish, none-too-smart Preysing. Crawford is still at the height of her beauty as the sweet Flaemmenchen, and Garbo. Well, Garbo is at her peak here, and Goulding gives her plenty of time and space in which to emote. It’s a lavish set of interlocking melodramas.

I saw this film at the long-gone Ricketson Cinema – a pristine print perfectly screened, rich and detailed, working all in glistening degrees of silver. It was one of my top viewing experiences ever. It still holds up.

The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang.