This is Greta Garbo's best silent movie, and maybe her best movie, period. Some posters have noted that the story is a bit goofy. That's because in the original novel, the Garbo character's husband commits suicide on his wedding night because he has syphilis; due to censorship, this was changed to his being an embezzler. Thus the heroine's subsequent public promiscuity to protect his name, and the fact that everyone treats her like a leper, make very little sense. Yet the brilliant cast and director manage to put the original meaning across anyway.
But although sex and scandal are the story's raison d'etre, what makes the movie memorable is that it captures something essential about the time it was made (the end of the Roaring 20s): a restless, heedless cynicism and emptiness, a bitter gaiety, a mixture of desire and melancholy. And most of all, it shows the "new woman" of the 20s -- not a bug-eyed flapper doing a wild Charleston, but a woman who makes no fuss about being as strong and self-willed as a man. And in that respect, being so true to its own time, it achieves timelessness.
There's a great moment when Garbo strides up to her disapproving older nemesis in a belted polo coat and cloche hat with a cigarette dangling from her lips. She stands there until he's forced to offer her a light, then instead pulls a lighter from her pocket and insolently does it herself. Another when she's on her honeymoon with a man she doesn't love, and she lies in bed switching the light on and off -- you realize that she's bored, impatient, horny, and regretful all at once.
The story seems most dated when the characters are discussing whether or not Garbo is "good" or "decent." The men in the movie all stand around, trying to understand her and failing. She's beyond their narrow categories -- she has more wit, courage and intelligence than any of them. Watching her, she makes me ache with the feeling (like every other spectator, I'm sure) that the only one who's really capable of appreciating her is... me.
But although sex and scandal are the story's raison d'etre, what makes the movie memorable is that it captures something essential about the time it was made (the end of the Roaring 20s): a restless, heedless cynicism and emptiness, a bitter gaiety, a mixture of desire and melancholy. And most of all, it shows the "new woman" of the 20s -- not a bug-eyed flapper doing a wild Charleston, but a woman who makes no fuss about being as strong and self-willed as a man. And in that respect, being so true to its own time, it achieves timelessness.
There's a great moment when Garbo strides up to her disapproving older nemesis in a belted polo coat and cloche hat with a cigarette dangling from her lips. She stands there until he's forced to offer her a light, then instead pulls a lighter from her pocket and insolently does it herself. Another when she's on her honeymoon with a man she doesn't love, and she lies in bed switching the light on and off -- you realize that she's bored, impatient, horny, and regretful all at once.
The story seems most dated when the characters are discussing whether or not Garbo is "good" or "decent." The men in the movie all stand around, trying to understand her and failing. She's beyond their narrow categories -- she has more wit, courage and intelligence than any of them. Watching her, she makes me ache with the feeling (like every other spectator, I'm sure) that the only one who's really capable of appreciating her is... me.