TxMike There is something about Leslie Caron. I was an instant fan when I saw her older movies, and I remained a fan with her newer movies. She is best known for her sweetness and her dancing, but mostly overlooked is that she is a fine dramatic and comedic actress also.Here Leslie Caron is Fanny, still a teenager as the movie begins, even though she was almost 30 during filming. She lives in a close-knit fishing area on the Marseilles harbor. Also there is Horst Buchholz, in his late 20s during filming, as teenager Marius. They grew up together and there is some affection between them, but we don't really know how much. Maurice Chevalier, already in his 70s, is local raconteur Panisse who operates his small business. A widower, he has no children, but has saved the letters "& SON" for the front of the building, still hoping one day he will have a son. He is sweet on Fanny, in spite of their great age difference, but no one takes that too seriously.Marius has wanderlust for the sea, he wants to sail and see the world while he is young. |Fanny doesn't want him to go, but she cares for him and wants him to be happy, so encourages him. Much later we find out she didn't really want him to go. They have a one-night fling of passion and, after Marius is gone, Fanny finds out she is with child. To save face for everyone, Fanny decides to marry Panisse, and even though all the close friends realize the biological father is Marius, Panisse is proud to call the boy his son. Fanny is a faithful wife, although we eventually find out their marriage is only one of convenience. A fine 1960s romantic drama with several big stars of that period. Highly recommended. Watched on Netflix streaming movies.SPOILERS: Around the time the boy turned 1 Marius returned to the area. He had a brief encounter with Fanny, they both professed love for each other but did the right thing and afterwards stayed away from each other. Fanny, Panisse, and their son became a very nice family life together. When the boy was about 10 or so Marius re-entered the picture, Panisse realized how much he and Fanny loved each other, and how well the boy got along with Marius, he had a letter of "proposal" written, for Marius to marry Fanny when Panisse died, which appeared to be very soon.

whpratt1 Leslie Caron, (Fanny) was fantastic in this romantic story where she shines like a very sweet and pretty young girl who grew up with a young man and they were both very much in love. Fanny's mother sells all kinds of fish on the water front docks and Fanny helps sell fish also. The young man who Fanny loves is the son of Charles Boyer, (Cesar) and he owns a sort of café and his son loves Fanny very much but he is getting tired of his father's café and wants to go to sea and become a sailor. The story takes an about face when this young man has to make up his mind if he wants to marry Fanny or go to sea, which his father would not be very happy about. This is a great love story and it will hold your interest from the very beginning to the very end.

bkoganbing Though I would love to have heard some of Harold Rome's songs sung on screen as a straight dramatic story, Fanny does quite well. Maybe director and co-author Joshua Logan knew what he was doing when he brought Fanny to the screen that way.Fanny is set in France's second city of Marseilles which has a better reputation as being a lot like Chicago and not just in population. Most stories set in Marseilles concentrate on the city's underworld.But this one concerns their most ancient industry, fishing and some of the characters on their waterfront. Charles Boyer is a tavern owner and he's got a son Horst Buchholtz who dreams of going to sea and a life of adventure, as a lot of young men will. But a fishmonger's's daughter named Fanny played by Leslie Caron's got eyes only for him. And one night's roll in the hay leaves Fanny something to remember him by.Not to fear though, aging shop-owner Maurice Chevalier, a recent widower would like what the Americans call a trophy wife. He's ready to save her good name and marry the girl and bring the kid up as his own.Before the Broadway musical the original story was told in French cinema in a three part trilogy by Marcel Pagnol. The parts that Boyer, Caron, Buchholtz, and Chevalier play were done on Broadway by Ezio Pinza, Florence Henderson, William Tabbert and Walter Slezak. Slezak got a Tony Award. The play ran 888 performances in 1954 to 1956.The most prominent song in the musical was the title song Fanny which Eddie Fisher had a hit record from. It and the rest of the score is heard in the background.Fanny was up for several nominations for Oscars including Best Picture, Best Actor for Charles Boyer and Best Director for Joshua Logan who primarily worked on stage. Still the award it should have gotten was for Jack Cardiff's color cinematography. He's one of the very best at his game and he makes the colorful city of Marseilles the biggest star in this film.Fanny holds up very well as fresh as when I saw it in the theaters in 1961. You might even consider visiting Marseilles after seeing this film.

moonspinner55 Leslie Caron is quite wonderful playing the love-starved daughter of a fish-market saleswoman on the Paris waterfront who sets her sights on the son of the tavern owner. After a night in her bed, the paths of the young lovers separate, but soon there's a baby on the way and Caron realizes a father will be needed so as not to shame her hard-working mother. Marcel Pagnol's star-crossed trilogy ("Marius", "Fanny", and "César") about life and love in Marseille was first turned into a hit Broadway musical, soon adapted into this non-musical film directed by Joshua Logan. You can easily spot where the songs might have been (the scenes surge forth in emotion, but have no emotional outlet beyond the dialogue). However, Caron just kept getting better and better as an actress, and any trace of self-consciousness as a performer was, by this point, minute. Lots of wily eccentrics dot the supporting cast, with friendly adversaries Maurice Chevalier and Charles Boyer relishing their roles (they're both deliciously mad, like characters out of Lewis Carroll). As the baby's father, Horst Buchholz is handsome and has a few fine scenes, but he's out of his league within this company and doesn't quite connect with Boyer, portraying his father. The film is long and contains possibly too many Mount Rushmore close-ups of La Caron, but indeed it's a handsome piece of work, with Harold Rome's songs now used for the pleasant background score. If viewers can get through the clunky first act, the absorbing plot becomes a surprisingly fine study of missed opportunities, decisions, and human feelings. *** from ****