Walk to the Nevada side of the California state line and have them throw the money to you. Walk away. Do not enter California,” he is said to have told Hawks.

Gary Cooper, and while they vacationed and drank together, apparently the subject of the movie was never raised between them.

Helen Hayes. His jealous friend Major Rinaldi (a mustachioed Adolphe Menjou complete with an Italian accent) conspires against them by having Catherine transferred to Milan, but when Frederick is wounded and ends up in the same Milan hospital, the lovers are reunited and Catherine gets pregnant. Frederick, unknowing, goes back to the war; Catherine goes to Switzerland to have her baby. Rinaldi intercepts their letters. When Frederick eventually learns of Catherine’s pregnancy and whereabouts, he deserts the army to go look for her. Their reunion is tragic or happy, depending on the version seen.

color:#333333;background:white’>Fredric March was originally supposed to take on the lead but dropped out when his choice of director, John Cromwell, was replaced by Borzage, and the role was offered to Cooper. Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (today’s MPAA which censored movies back then) were unhappy with, color:#202122;background:white’>references to labor pains, toning down the birth scene, and hiding Catherine’s pregnancy bump behind props. The Hayes Code would not be enforced for another two years, which explains why scenes like soldiers visiting brothels were left in. Hemingway’s contempt for the Italian army in the novel never even made it into the script from the get-go. A subsequent 1938 release of the movie had even more cuts.

background:white’>Farewellwas rereleased in 1938 with further cuts, down to 78 minutes, and remade twice in the 1950s. The 1932 original disappeared from screens. It reemerged on television in the 1980s with 10 missing minutes from the original. The studio in the title credits was now Warner Bros. who had taken over some Paramount assets by then (that’s the version on Amazon Prime right now; that version is also missing the seduction scene). It is now in the public domain with various versions online at various lengths, including an unrestored version on YouTube.

Gary Cooper and Helen Hayes in A Farewell to Arms (1932)

Paramount

 

The restored version was shown on TCM in 2004, back to 89 minutes with the Paramount logo opening and closing the film as it did in 1932. It was preserved by the UCLA Film and Television Archive with funding from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and The Film Foundation. The restoration was done from a 35 mm nitrate print obtained from David O. Selznick’s estate (the Paramount 1932 version) provided by George Eastman House. Twelve minutes cut from the 1938 reissue were restored; both endings were also preserved.