Is it a happy or a sad ending? - SPOILER ALERT

On one hand I think this is supposed to be a love story with a happy ending. I can see that but something about that doesn't ring true to me. It makes more sense as a tragic story with a sad ending (at least from Marian's point of view). Given the title of the movie, the sad story seems to make more sense. How do you see it?

1. A love story: Forrester rescues Marian. She marries him out of gratitude but he helps her to live again. She believes she’s found love and is ready to leave him. He so loves her, he suffers a heart attack. In helping him recover, she discovers she has fallen in love with him and he is the true love of her life.

This may be a ‘happy’ ending but it seems contrived and doesn’t really work with the title.


2. A sad story: Forrester helps Marian through a difficult time but takes advantage of her weakened mental state to get her to marry him. He leads her to believe that she has an out, honesty; but as she rediscovers her life and falls in love again, she finds she is stuck. Forrester fakes an illness in order to get her to stay with him. She gives up her love and resigns herself to a life with a man she doesn’t love but she tries to convince him and herself that she does love him.

I feel the title fits this view of the movie better; Marian is and has always been a lost lady. Her first love, Montgomery, was a philanderer. He is murdered in front of her. She's forced to give up her second love, Ellinger. and she's stuck with an old man who has helped her but she has never loved.


Woman, man! That's the way it should be Tarzan. [Tarzan and his mate]