Grand Hotel (1932)

Grand Hotel (1932)

In director Edmund Goulding's (and MGM's) melodramatic, Best Picture-winning ensemble film, it was an example of a portmanteau picture that featured all of MGM's stars of Hollywood's Golden Age. William A. Drake's screenplay was based on his own play adaptation of author/playwright Vicki Baum's 1929 best-selling novel Menschen im Hotel (translated 'People at the Hotel'). Baum's writings were based on her own real-life experience as a chambermaid at two well-known Berlin hotels.

Basically, the entire cast of the pre-Code film was from MGM's star-making 'film factory' to give prestige to the production. The revolutionary film marked the first major use of a large all-star cast in a non-musical, narrative film (it was advertised as having "the greatest cast ever assembled," recalling MGM's slogan that famously boasted that it had "more stars than there are in heaven").

Before the film was released, the tale was presented as a Broadway stage-play version to test its popularity. It opened in NYC in mid-November 1930 and became a major hit (and played for over a year with 459 performances). Afterwards, the film was developed as a major MGM project, and given a spectacular premiere at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, with top-priced seats at 1ドル.50!

The film's setting between the wars was at Berlin's ritzy, opulent art-deco Grand Hotel, the city's most expensive hotel. The episodic film (at 112 minutes in length) presented a bygone era, and told the multiple-narrative story of the criss-crossing of the lives of five major guests whose fates intertwined for a two-day period at the hotel. All of the guests were struggling with either their finances, scandals, health, emotional loneliness, or social standing in multiple storylines.

The film clearly resonated with Depression-Era audiences, who were also financially desperate, in the midst of strivings and worries about their futures, but intrigued and entertained by famous celebrity faces in an appealing melodramatic soap-opera. Extravagant art direction was provided by MGM's famed art designer Cedric Gibbons.

It won the Best Picture Oscar in the year of its release - its only nomination. Only two other times has the film named Best Picture failed to win any other awards: Broadway Melody (1928/9) and Mutiny On the Bounty (1935). It remains - to date - the only film to win Best Picture without having any other nominations. It was remade as MGM's Week-End at the Waldorf (1945), directed by Robert Z. Leonard and starring Ginger Rogers, Lana Turner, and Walter Pidgeon, plus more. A Tony Award-winning musical-stage version opened on Broadway in NYC in late 1989, and proceeded to have over 1,000 performances.

• during the opening credits, each of the main performers received a separate screen, identifying their cast names:
  • GRETA GARBO as GRUSINSKAYA...the dancer
  • JOHN BARRYMORE as The BARON
  • JOAN CRAWFORD as FLAEMMCHEN...the stenographer
  • WALLACE BEERY as General Director PREYSING
  • LIONEL BARRYMORE as OTTO KRINGELEIN
    
  • LEWIS STONE as DOCTOR OTTERNSCHLAG
  • JEAN HERSHOLT as SENF, the Porter

• afterwards, the camera tracked from left to right, across a busy row of telephone operators, handling five simultaneous telephone conversations between most of the film's major characters (guests at Berlin's Grand Hotel); briefly, the hotel's head porter Senf (Jean Hersholt) called a hospital regarding his wife's condition delivering a baby; accountant Otto Kringelein (Lionel Barrymore), recently determined to be terminally-ill, called to say he would remain at the hotel in the most expensive room until his death; Otto's boss - textile industrial magnate General Director Preysing (Wallace Beery), called his wife to tell her he was concerned about important and pending business deals he was about to make in Berlin; Suzette (Rafaela Ottiano), Mme. Grusinskaya's (Greta Garbo) personal maid, called to explain how the fragile, isolated, aging, sickly Russian prima ballerina performer wouldn't be attending her dance rehearsal; and finally, the financially-broke and ruined Baron Von Gaigern (John Barrymore) was plotting the theft of the ballerina's jewels (pearls) from her hotel room
• one of the film's first major lines of dialogue was delivered in the lobby by world-weary, disfigured war veteran and house physician Dr. Otternschlag (Lewis Stone), who observed his surroundings:
  • "Grand Hotel. People coming, going. Nothing ever happens."
• the attractive, beautiful young stenographer Miss Flaemmchen (Joan Crawford), a typically ambitious, on-the-make working girl hired by General Preysing, arrived at the hotel and proceeded to Preysing's hotel room on the 6th floor; she aspired to be a movie star and live the good life; as she awaited Preysing outside the room, she became acquainted in the circular hallway with the persistent and flirtatious Baron Felix von Gaigern - a suave, noble, elegant and dashing gentleman, actually an opportunistic hotel jewel thief
• with a daring line, the Baron propositioned her in the hotel's 6th floor outer corridor with a very forward, playful Pre-Code inquiry after learning her occupation:
  • "I don't suppose you'd, uh, take some dictation from me sometime, would you?
• she declined, but they agreed to meet the following evening at 5 pm to attend the hotel's dance; shortly later while taking dictation from the General, Flaemmchen mentioned how she was an aspiring actress, had a number of boyfriends, and posed as a model for art studies classes; she hinted that she might offer him something more than dictation, but at a price; however, he vowed to remain faithful to his wife of 28 years
• the Baron was awaiting the departure (to the theater) of the fragile, isolated, aging, suicidal, forlorn, lonely-for-love Russian ballerina Grusinskaya (Greta Garbo, Swedish), a guest at the hotel; once she left, he entered her room from the balcony's outside window to rob her of her jewels (pearls), but she returned unexpectedly, still garbed in her ballet costume, and uttered to her manager: "I want to be alone"; when he suggested canceling her Vienna contract, her next scheduled engagement, she again insisted: "I just want to be alone"; her contract was ended - and everyone vacated the room as she despaired and talked of suicide; she phoned the theater and learned that her back-up dancer Duprez was performing in her place; Grusinskaya surmised: "They didn't miss me at all. They didn't even miss me."

• while contemplating suicide, the Baron suddenly emerged from his hiding place, and told her how much he admired her beauty and work on the ballet stage; he professed his love for her - encouraging her to live - and although she also begged him: "But I want to be alone," he urged her to let him stay with her; presumably, the two spent the overnight together making love in her room
• the next morning, the Baron described his background (calling himself "a criminal and a hotel thief"), but also vowed his true love to the dancer: "You must believe one thing. You must believe that I love you. That I've never known love like this until now"; then he handed back her purloined jewels; she detested his crime, but forgave him, and told him he could keep the pearls: "You may keep the pearls. I don't want them"; he convinced her of his deep love after repeatedly telling her that he had a change of heart after meeting her
• they shared sensuous kisses, and made plans to leave for Vienna on the train for her next theater performance and start their lives over; she was immensely happy for the positive change in her life; however, she ignored news from her manager that her Vienna engagement had been cancelled
• the same day, the tyrannical, unethical General Preysing was engaged in merger talks, and negotiated a dishonest business deal by not disclosing the full facts of his failing business; he bluffed and lied under the desperate circumstances by telling the negotiators that he had successfully agreed to a merger with the Manchester Cotton Company
• afterwards, Preysing sought to look up his stenographer in the hotel's Yellow Room; in the bar, after dancing together, Flaemmchen listened as the Baron's confessed that he had fallen in love with someone else since they last met; also, the dying Kringelein had an opportunity to complain to his "industrial magnate" boss about his enslavement of workers with unfair wages and work conditions; In retaliation, Kringelein was accused of embezzling company funds while working as a bookkeeper; Preysing lunged and grabbed Kringelein by the neck, and in a rage, he discharged Kringelein on the spot
• Preysing offered Flaemmchen a job to accompany him to England on a business trip as his personal typewriting stenographer - she agreed to his ulterior motive - to be "bought" and to prostitute herself; she accepted for 1,000 marks as payment; revealing his real intentions to be intimate with her that evening, Preysing suggested getting her a connected/adjoining room for the night

• meanwhile, the demanding Chauffeur (who represented a criminal group and had earlier insisted on the Baron's hotel thievery of pearls) threatened to put a bullet in the Baron's head, if he didn't pay his debt of 5,000 marks; the heavily-indebted Baron was still planning to leave Berlin that evening with the ballet dancer after her final performance; he attempted to win at Baccarat, but lost all his money; however, the drunken Kringelein won 14,000 marked stuffed into his wallet, but then accidentally discarded his wallet; it was found by the Baron who hesitated to return it, but ultimately gave it back to the grateful old man
• later that evening, a transformed and jubilant Grusinskaya returned to the hotel after her final triumphant Berlin performance; at the same time, in Preysing's bedroom, he attempted to proposition her - after complimenting her slender figure, he asked with a leering hint:
  • "Are you going to be nice to me?... Very nice?...Miss Flaemm. You like me just a little bit, don't you?"
• but then, the General was distracted by a moving shadow in the room, and caught the Baron stealing his wallet; after a brief struggle, Preysing bashed the Baron's head with a telephone and murdered him; Flaemmchen entered and saw the Baron's body on the floor, and ran screaming to report the homicide (although Preysing claimed that he was being robbed, and tried to convince both Kringelein and Flaemmchen to corroborate his version of the incident)
• by the next morning, Preysing was arrested for murder; meanwhile, Grusinskaya had vainly been attempting to contact the Baron; the sorrowful Kringelein and Flaemmchen commiserated together about the Baron, acknowledging that he was a burglar only because of extreme desperation; Flaemmchen decided to accept Kringelein's offer to travel to Paris's Grand Hotel with him to look for a cure to his illness; and as Grusinskaya was leaving for her train, she was falsely told that the Baron would be awaiting her at the station

• as Grusinskaya's entourage pulled away from the front of the hotel, another car pulled up, with two honeymooners (Mr. and Mrs. Hoffman (Milton Holmes and Mary Carlisle); the hospital finally phoned Senf with news that his wife had successfully delivered a baby boy; and Flaemmchen and Kringelein also departed from the hotel on their way to the train station bound for Paris
• the film's final line, a mirror of the earlier line voiced in the lobby, was again from Dr. Otternschlag, who never received messages at the desk nor noticed the multi-charactered dramas in the hotel, and how their lives were changed:
  • "The Grand Hotel. Always the same. People come. People go. Nothing ever happens"
• outside, the driver of an arriving bus announced:
  • "Grand Hotel!"