Camille (1921)
I stumbled on a great clean copy of this packaged with the more famous Garbo talkie version from 1936, and it was interesting mostly as a comparison. Here for the first time I got to study the famous Rudolph Valentino (the "matinee idol" of the period). And in the leading role as the modernized Camille was Alla Nazimova, a Russian actress with serious aspirations and some success in the era.
The film is a stubborn one to like, however. While not badly made, it has the stiff and sometimes plodding editing, scene to scene, that implies an audience that might not keep up with a more sophisticated treatment. (And more complex editing was common by 1921, for sure.) The acting, silent as it is, is false enough often enough to push a modern viewer off. Nazimova has this fabulous and distracting giant hairpiece on, for some reason, as if to show she's truly wild, but her acting is almost too serious for the fun she is meant to inspire.
The set design is a wonder in many ways, having a modern flair that precedes Art Deco and might interest fans of that mid-20s style. The camera, however, is often satisfied to center the scene and sit and watch the events. Bitzer (with Griffith) knew the dangers of this years earlier, and little known director Ray Smallwood is clearly not making the most of some very dramatic moments.
The story, in brief, is about a spirited young woman who is at the age where she must marry to survive, and she falls between a rich, dull count and a handsome, adorable common person (Valentino). What plays out is something very unfamiliar to Western women in our era, because the main woman (who is called Marguerite) is trapped by really needing a man to support her, period. True love with a relatively poor chap just won't do, and yet of course true love is true love, and Valentino promises to support her one way or another. But his (of all people) father interferes and and basically dashes true love on the rocks.
The end is unremittingly tragic, the camera again centered on the final scene.
See it? No, I'd so not, unless you have some deep interest in either the story or one of the main actors. The plot is based on a Dumas classic from 1848, and is most famous for having inspired the great opera, La Traviata. If you want a quite good movie on these events, see the Garbo version.
I stumbled on a great clean copy of this packaged with the more famous Garbo talkie version from 1936, and it was interesting mostly as a comparison. Here for the first time I got to study the famous Rudolph Valentino (the "matinee idol" of the period). And in the leading role as the modernized Camille was Alla Nazimova, a Russian actress with serious aspirations and some success in the era.
The film is a stubborn one to like, however. While not badly made, it has the stiff and sometimes plodding editing, scene to scene, that implies an audience that might not keep up with a more sophisticated treatment. (And more complex editing was common by 1921, for sure.) The acting, silent as it is, is false enough often enough to push a modern viewer off. Nazimova has this fabulous and distracting giant hairpiece on, for some reason, as if to show she's truly wild, but her acting is almost too serious for the fun she is meant to inspire.
The set design is a wonder in many ways, having a modern flair that precedes Art Deco and might interest fans of that mid-20s style. The camera, however, is often satisfied to center the scene and sit and watch the events. Bitzer (with Griffith) knew the dangers of this years earlier, and little known director Ray Smallwood is clearly not making the most of some very dramatic moments.
The story, in brief, is about a spirited young woman who is at the age where she must marry to survive, and she falls between a rich, dull count and a handsome, adorable common person (Valentino). What plays out is something very unfamiliar to Western women in our era, because the main woman (who is called Marguerite) is trapped by really needing a man to support her, period. True love with a relatively poor chap just won't do, and yet of course true love is true love, and Valentino promises to support her one way or another. But his (of all people) father interferes and and basically dashes true love on the rocks.
The end is unremittingly tragic, the camera again centered on the final scene.
See it? No, I'd so not, unless you have some deep interest in either the story or one of the main actors. The plot is based on a Dumas classic from 1848, and is most famous for having inspired the great opera, La Traviata. If you want a quite good movie on these events, see the Garbo version.