Greta Garbo Centennial DVD

Anna Christie (1930): Garbo made her landmark transition to ""Talkies"" with this film playing a former prostitute whose past threatens her chance for happiness. A different director and cast join Garbo in a German-language version (Side B with English subtitles) filmed on the same sound stages immediately after the English version. Later Garbo called it the better film and this new DVD release gives fans the rare opportunity to compare the two versions. Mata Hari (1931): Garbo is mesmerizing as a dancer turned German secret agent in wartime Paris seething with... secrets and betrayal. The notable supporting cast includes Lionel Barrymore as a Russian general in love with her Lewis Stone as an icy master spy and Ramon Novarro as a handsome aviator who wins the heart Mata Hari did not know she possessed. Queen Christina (1933): To escape the burdens of the monarchy Sweden's Queen Christina (Garbo) rides into the countryside disguised as a boy. She meets and secretly falls for a dashing Spanish envoy on his way to the royal court. When her lover's true identity is revealed Christina knows her people will not accept her marriage to a foreigner. Torn between her duty and her heart she must make a fateful decision. Garbo is luminous in this lavish costume drama starring with her one-time off-screen fianc John Gilbert under the direction of Rouben Mamoulian. Anna Karenina (1935): Leo Tolstoy's novel of a dutiful wife and doting mother who gives up her life of contentment to experience real passion receives sumptuous treatment in a David O. Selznick production. Clarence Brown directs a stellar cast - including Fredric March Basil Rathbone Maureen O'Sullivan and Freddie Bartholomew. Greta Garbo is the soul of the film in a nuanced performance that won the New York Film Critics Best Actress Award. At the height of her art Garbo is unforgettable as a woman helpless in love's grasp and heartbroken at the loss of her son. Camille (1936): Life in 1847 Paris is as spirited as champagne and as unforgiving as the gray morning after. In gambling dens and lavish soirees men of means exert their wills and women turned courtesans exult in pleasure. One such woman is Marguerite Gautier (Garbo) the Camille of this sumptuous romantic tale based on the enduring Alexandre Dumas story. Garbo earned an Academy Award nomination and the New York Film Critics Best Actress Award for her memorable work in this George Cukor-directed film. Ninotchka (1939): Garbo shines in her first comedy a frothy tale of a dour Russian envoy sublimating her womanhood for Soviet brotherhood until she falls for a suave Parisian man-about-town (Melvyn Douglas). Working from a clever script written in part by Billy Wilder director Ernst Lubitsch knew better than anyone how to marry refinement with sublime wit. That's how we see Garbo's love struck Ninotchka: serenely dignified yet endearingly ridiculous. [show more]

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