One other point - there are five separate time periods in the movie, not six. Hepburn's hairstyles tell you where you are, and so do the automobiles (thanks to the registrations stickers on the windshields)
I count Mark's cheating with the blonde when, we gather, Joanna's at home with Caroline as a baby still being fed at 3 in the morning, as a sixth time period (say, 1961).
Of course, a chronological edit loses way too much to be ever *preferable* to Donen's ingenious version, not least for the reasons you mention. Still, it can be revealing. For example, it does rub in how slippery certain points are.
Example: Joanna and Mark do more than just glimpse each other on the ferry, for example, they *do* exchange words, she very forwardly fishes out his passport from his bag, etc. (Indeed, it's almost inconceivable given both their natures that they wouldn't have flirted on immediately on the ferry, but set that aside).
In the chronological version it seems a little preposterous for Joanna to (2 seconds later) say and act as though she'd never met/spoken to Mark before when she runs across him on the tractor. The 'tractor' scene is separated by 8 minutes from the ferry scene in Donen's cut and that's *just* enough to not notice (in our real time) the discrepancy and implausibility (at least I'd never noticed the problem).
And Donen's version has a larger poetry to it - couples just do *love* to tell their own origin myths and often they do have multiple, slightly incompatible versions if you pay close attention.
On the film's commentary track, director Stanley Donen says that Joanna isn't "really completely aware of Mark's sexual transgressions" (note the plural) - at least, not in the same way that Mark is aware of hers.
Good, thanks for that. Given that was Donen's (and presumably Raphael's) intention it is kind of remarkable how much they play down Mark's fling or flings, e.g., Joanna never attempts to partially excuse her straying as tit-for-tat. If I had to guess, I'd say Donen's basic idea is prevent Mark becoming too unlikeable (a lot of people can't credit that Joanna would continue to put up with Mark as things stand; imagine how much greater that audience reaction would be if her nose were rubbed in his straying a lot more) and also to keep things kind of symmetrical: Mark's been discrete and hasn't in this primal way humiliated her whereas Joanna's straying is out-in-the-open and much more brutal and humiliating.
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murph24
12 years ago
I count Mark's cheating with the blonde when, we gather, Joanna's at home with Caroline as a baby still being fed at 3 in the morning, as a sixth time period (say, 1961).
Donen himself says there are five time periods on the commentary track; Joanna and Caroline could have easily joined him a few months, or even a few weeks, after the car had been "run in."
Example: Joanna and Mark do more than just glimpse each other on the ferry, for example, they *do* exchange words, she very forwardly fishes out his passport from his bag, etc. (Indeed, it's almost inconceivable given both their natures that they wouldn't have flirted on immediately on the ferry, but set that aside).
I never said that glimpsing each other was the only thing that happened between them on the ferry; just that this marked the beginning of the 1954 sequence. Originally, there were more scenes on the ferry that established Mark's awareness of ALL the choir girls. In Frederic Raphael's published screenplay for Two For The Road, there's a scene at the ferry snack bar where Mark is buying a sandwich from the display case while the choir girls are standing next to it; the clerk asks Mark which sandwich he wants, and he responds that he's not particular - that any of them would do. And when he says this, the girls giggle, aware of the double meaning in his response. Later, when the cars on the ship disembark, Mark tries to hitch a ride at the bottom of the runway; all the passengers ignore him, including the choir girls in the VW minibus. That's why he gloats rather grandly on the tractor; the girls now need his assistance - after they'd refused him before.
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swanstep
12 years ago
Donen himself says there are five time periods on the commentary track; Joanna and Caroline could have easily joined him a few months, or even a few weeks, after the car had been "run in."
Well, my own guess is that Donen's just not counting the very short 'cheating' segment that's apparently when Caroline's still a baby ('When I'm not being woken at 3 in the morning, I feel very paternal.') and money/work's still hard to come by as a distinct time-period. That's perfectly fair of him, but I think my way of counting makes sense too.
Thanks for the additional info about the ferry scenes that either weren't shot or didn't make the cut. Clearly if any of that stuff has been included they'd *really* have had to alter Joanna's initial V.O. in the tractor scene.
Anyhow, I've put my chronological edit of Two For The Road (an exact counterpart of the dvd extra/easter-egg that Memento gives you to watch *it* in chrono. sequence) up on vimeo (youtube didn't buy my scholarly fair use defense) here:
http://vimeo.com/58958265While a chronological edit loses way too much to be ever *preferable* to Donen's ingenious original, it's still worth watching/grabbing a copy of I'd say (and would be a good extra for the still absent blu-ray edition of TFTR to include).
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murph24
12 years ago
...my own guess is that Donen's just not counting the very short 'cheating' segment that's apparently when Caroline's still a baby ('When I'm not being woken at 3 in the morning, I feel very paternal.')
Well, if that's the way you see it, that's the way you see it. Personally, I think Donen is highly aware of every time period in Two For The Road, and Raphael's published screenplay also makes it clear that Mark's fling with the blonde doesn't take place a few years before 1963. As we see in their argument scene following the change of hotels (which takes place after he makes his "paternal" comment), Caroline is still in a crib and still needs attention when she wakes up during the night. And Mark makes it clear in his VO that his days of designing corporation bus shelters are behind him; if money and work were hard to come by, I doubt he'd be driving a spiffy new Triumph.
The additional scenes in the ferry wouldn't have altered the need to change Joanna's VO when she sees Mark in the tractor; the girls could have been "putty" about Mark but still recognize there was no room for him in the van without bunching up. Of course, Joanna still says "I'd never even spoken to you," in the final cut, even after the audience has watched her saying "You're welcome" to Mark aboard the ferry. But we have to entertain the possibility that Joanna didn't categorize two perfunctory words like "you're welcome" as actually SPEAKING to him (in the sense of having a conversation with him).
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