Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		5.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		3.0
Overall		4.0

The Baker's Wife Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman January 3, 2021

David Merrick was arguably the most successful producer in the annals of Broadway history since Florenz Ziegfield. Merrick also had an outsized ego and suffered neither fools, nor at times employees, gladly, though according to many reports he was able to be an unabashed martinet while still maintaining an aura of cordiality. On occasion, that proclivity could actually end up delighting the public at large, as when Merrick rather famously got people with the same names as the major New York theatrical critics to offer raves for a musical called Subways are for Sleeping that had been met with indifference by the actual journalists working for the major print and broadcast media in New York City. On other occasions, however, Merrick could be the bane of various folk’s existence, and that certainly seemed to be the case, at least in passing, when Merrick reportedly ran into the orchestral pit of a theater where a Broadway bound musical version of The Baker’s Wife by Stephen Schwartz and Joseph Stein was playing, and then either (according to who is telling the story) ripped up or absconded with the score to what ultimately arguably became the best known number from the show, and one of the crowning glories of Schwartz’s entire career, “Meadowlark”. That may portend not just churlishness but actual musical bad taste on the part of Merrick, but the story has at least attained a kind of quasi-mythical status that has weirdly maybe helped to keep memories of the musical (which unfortunately never did get to Broadway, but managed to eke out a West End run) and the film which inspired it alive, at least for "theater geeks" prone to gossip.

In a way, it's easy to see why a producer of David Merrick's financial acuity might want to musicalize The Baker's Wife, since the story is charming, features an "exotic" location, and probably most importantly (from a money outlay standpoint) doesn't require a huge cast. (In that regard, when a "cast recording" of the aborted Broadway bound version was finally undertaken, it was deemed sufficient to only have three principal characters sing on it, though the actual musical has other material sung by a variety of characters.) The story takes place in a rustic French village where among the toil of everyday life "little" pleasures like the wonderments cooked up by local baker with salient name Aimable (Raimu) help to make things at least a bit better. Unfortunately, the title character, whose name is actually Aurélie (Ginette Leclerc), decides to run off with a seductive shepherd (Charles Moulin), leaving Aimable destitute. So destitute, in fact, that he no longer wants to bake his daily apportionment of bread for the village, which understandably sets off alarm bells with the local populace.

Three local townspeople, who might be seen as representative of various socioeconomic strata and even philosophical bents, work together to try to find Aurélie in order to convince her to return to her husband and set everything right. The trio includes the Marquis (Fernand Charpin), an exemplar of the landed gentry; the village's schoolteacher (Robert Bassac); and the Priest (Robert Vattier), with the latter two having been introduced with a dialectic of sorts as they argue about the veracity of stories concerning Joan of Arc. In what on its surface probably seems like a rather slight story, Aurélie is in fact found, the Shepherd takes off into them thar hills, and order is returned to the village as Aimable, reunited with his spouse, once again feels inspired to bake. (In that regard, it's perhaps salient to note that some on the creative crew of the musical version felt that it tried to stuff things too full, no pun intended, leading to a bloated presentation and inordinate running time, which was thought to play into a general feeling that things just weren't working. Merrick's issue with "Meadowlark" in fact is that the song went on for over seven minutes, and he felt audiences grew restive during it.)

If that surface of The Baker's Wife might appear to be disconcertedly shallow, commentator Brett Bowles helps to elucidate some of the subtext, which definitely manages to give the film significant depth. Some of this pertains to regional differences in France, since Marcel Pagnol was often interested in the disconnect between places like a Provençal village and more urban sensibilities from "up north". And, as evidenced by that opening skirmish between the Priest and schoolteacher, there's also a rather heady running subplot about religion vs. science, or at least faith vs. intellect. The film's depiction of Aurélie, who is consigned to a virtually wordless existence in the story, may still chafe at modern sensibilities, and in fact there may be more than a slightly discomfiting feeling to not just the relationship between Aurélie and Aimable (there's a rather large age difference), but also the "kiss and make up" sequence at the end has some disturbing asides, albeit hurled by Aimable to a supposedly wayward cat.

Note: For a somewhat darker look at village life in a film with a Pagnol connection, some may find Jean Renoir's Toni, available in a nice Blu-ray edition from Criterion that I recently reviewed, of some interest.

The Baker's Wife Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Baker's Wife is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of The Criterion Collection with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.37:1. In lieu of an insert booklet, Criterion offers an accordion style foldout with this release, which contains the following information on the restoration:

The Baker's Wife is presented in it original aspect ratio of 1.37:1. On widescreen televisions, black bars will appear on the left and right of the image to maintain the proper screen format. This new 4K digital restoration was undertaken by the Compagnie méditerranéenne de films, with support from the Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée, Région Sud, Département des Bouches-du-Rhône, and Fonds de dotation Marcel Pagnol. A new digital transfer was created on an ARRISCAN film scanner from the 35 mm nitrate original camera negative and restored at Digimage Classics/Hiventy in Joinville-le-Pont, France. A nitrate duplicate positive was used for sections where the negative was damaged.

The monaural soundtrack was remasterd from the original 35 mm soundtrack negative, which was scanned using the Sondor Resonances systems. The duplicate positive was also used where necessary.

This is a stunning looking restoration, especially considering the age of the film and Pagnol's then groundbreaking use of on location photography. Detail levels are excellent throughout, with textures on fabrics and even elements like the loaves of bread looking fantastically precise. Blacks are excellent throughout as well, and gray scale is very nicely nuanced. There are occasional slight downturns, which I'm assuming stem at least in part from the use of the duplicate positive element, with sometimes slightly more pronounced grain and occasional deficits in shadow detail (see screenshot 19), but these are simply momentary fluctuations in a generally superb presentation. While slightly variable per my above statement, grain resolves naturally throughout the presentation, and I noticed no compression problems.

The Baker's Wife Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Baker's Wife features a surprisingly spry sounding LPCM Mono track in the original French. The film's production era obviously means baseline fidelity here can be a little iffy at times, especially in some outdoor material that doesn't appear to have been post looped, but on the whole, dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout, and there are nice if subtle renderings of ambient environmental sounds as well. Optional English subtitles are available.

The Baker's Wife Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Marcel Pagnol Introduction (1080p; 5:31) offers some brief comments from Pagnol, filmed in 1967, I'm assuming for what was probably a broadcast on French television of the film. In French with English subtitles.


• Cineastes de Notre Temps (1080p; 26:09) is a 1966 television episode featuring Pagnol, who discusses The Baker's Wife among other subjects. In French with English subtitles.


• Memories of The Baker's Wife (1080p; 13:13) stems from a 1976 news feature from the Provençal region, and features Ginette Leclerc and Charles Moulin, along with residents of the town where Pagnol shot some of the material. In French with English subtitles.


• Selected Scene Commentary features Pagnol scholar Brett Bowles:

  Introduction (1080p; 3:54)

  
  

  Reconciling a Divided France (1080p; 11:44)

  
  

  The Folklore of Bakers and Bread (1080p; 11:33)

  
  

  Sexuality and Marriage (1080p; 11:47)

Additionally, an accordion style fold out insert features an essay by Ginette Vincendeau.

The Baker's Wife Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Anyone who is a fan of Marcel Pagnol, courtesy of everything from The Marseille Trilogy to quasi-Americanized efforts like Fanny, will enjoy the beautiful evocation of French village life, albeit in a "warts and all" fashion. The story here is perhaps misleadingly slight feeling, because, as the selected scene commentary points out, there's often a lot going on despite appearances. Both funny and rather melancholic by turns, The Baker's Wife deserves to be better remembered by those who perhaps aren't inveterate theater geeks prone to gossip. Criterion has provided a beautiful restoration of the film, along with its typically appealing array of supplements. Highly recommended.