Love (1927 film)
Encyclopedia
Love is a film directed by Edmund Goulding
Edmund Goulding
Edmund Goulding was a British film writer and director. As an actor early in his career he was one of the 'Ghosts' in the 1922 British made Paramount silent Three Live Ghosts alongside Norman Kerry and Cyril Chadwick. Also in the early 20s he wrote several screenplays for star Mae Murray and...

 and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...

. MGM made the film in order to capitalize on its winning romantic team of Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo , born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson, was a Swedish film actress. Garbo was an international star and icon during Hollywood's silent and classic periods. Many of Garbo's films were sensational hits, and all but three were profitable...

 and John Gilbert
John Gilbert (actor)
John Gilbert was an American actor and a major star of the silent film era.Known as "the great lover," he rivaled even Rudolph Valentino as a box office draw...

 who had starred in the 1926 blockbuster
Blockbuster (entertainment)
Blockbuster, as applied to film or theatre, denotes a very popular or successful production. The entertainment industry use was originally theatrical slang referring to a particularly successful play but is now used primarily by the film industry...

, Flesh and the Devil
Flesh and the Devil
Flesh and the Devil is an MGM romantic drama silent film. It stars Greta Garbo, John Gilbert, Lars Hanson, and Barbara Kent, directed by Clarence Brown, and based on the play The Undying Past by Hermann Sudermann....

.

Taking full advantage of the star power, a drama was scripted based on Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist...

's timeless novel, Anna Karenina
Anna Karenina
Anna Karenina is a novel by the Russian writer Leo Tolstoy, published in serial installments from 1873 to 1877 in the periodical The Russian Messenger...

. The result was a failure for the author's purists, but it provided the public with a taste of Gilbert-Garbo eroticism
Eroticism
Eroticism is generally understood to refer to a state of sexual arousal or anticipation of such – an insistent sexual impulse, desire, or pattern of thoughts, as well as a philosophical contemplation concerning the aesthetics of sexual desire, sensuality and romantic love...

 that would never again be matched. The publicity campaign for the film was one of the largest up to that time, and the title was changed from the original, Heat.

Plot

During a blizzard
Blizzard
A blizzard is a severe snowstorm characterized by strong winds. By definition, the difference between blizzard and a snowstorm is the strength of the wind. To be a blizzard, a snow storm must have winds in excess of with blowing or drifting snow which reduces visibility to 400 meters or ¼ mile or...

, Russian count Alexis Vronsky, aide-de-camp of the Grand Duke, meets a mysterious woman on the way to St. Petersburg, Russia. When they are forced to stop at an inn for the night, Vronsky attempts a seduction after she lifts her veil, revealing a beautiful face. She rejects him coldly.

Some time later, at a reception at his place for Senator Karenine, Vronsky is presented to the Senator's wife, Anna, the woman at the inn that cold night and he tries to ask forgiveness for his transgressions. This she finally grants but then he visits her in her home and kisses her passionately and she scolds him again ordering him to leave.

Anna has a young son, Sergei, with whom she has an almost incest
Incest
Incest is sexual intercourse between close relatives that is usually illegal in the jurisdiction where it takes place and/or is conventionally considered a taboo. The term may apply to sexual activities between: individuals of close "blood relationship"; members of the same household; step...

ious relationship which is thawed as a fiery passion develops between Anna and Vronsky. This is noted by the aristocracy
Aristocracy
Aristocracy , is a form of government in which a few elite citizens rule. The term derives from the Greek aristokratia, meaning "rule of the best". In origin in Ancient Greece, it was conceived of as rule by the best qualified citizens, and contrasted with monarchy...

 of St. Petersburg, to the displeasure of her husband. After a horse race, in which Anna makes a spectacle of herself and all but announces her love for Vronsky, she deserts her husband when he finds the two lovers in an hotel room. They go off to Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 together.

Anna cannot forget her son and suffers because she left him, Vronsky realizes this and even though he is jealous of her, returns to Russia with her. She plans to visit Sergei on his birthday, but Karenine prevents it, having told their son that his mother is dead. She overcomes her fear and goes to the house in any case but is found out by Karenine and ordered out of the house.

To make matters worse, the Grand Duke plans to have Vronsky removed from the army because he is cohabitating with Anna, who seeks to prevent him from losing his social position as she has lost hers. She goes to the Grand Duke and is able to reinstate Alexis, on the condition that she leave him, and St. Petersburg, forever.

Alternate ending (European version)

As a result of losing the right to visit her son and now having to leave Vronsky forever in order to save his reputation, she commits suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...

 and falls under a train.

Alternate ending (American version)

For three years the lovers do not see each other but Vronsky searches frantically for Anna. By chance, he reads in a newspaper an item on Anna's son, who is finishing at the Military Academy in St. Petersburg and will return for his visits.

On this occasion, he learns that Kareine is dead and that Anna visits her son daily. They met again when Sergei invites Vronsky to his home, and are reunited.

Cast

  • John Gilbert
    John Gilbert (actor)
    John Gilbert was an American actor and a major star of the silent film era.Known as "the great lover," he rivaled even Rudolph Valentino as a box office draw...

     as Captain Count Alexei Vronsky
  • Greta Garbo
    Greta Garbo
    Greta Garbo , born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson, was a Swedish film actress. Garbo was an international star and icon during Hollywood's silent and classic periods. Many of Garbo's films were sensational hits, and all but three were profitable...

     as Anna Karenina
  • George Fawcett
    George Fawcett
    George Fawcett was an American stage and film actor of the silent era. On stage he appeared in such plays as Ghosts with the controversial Mary Shaw, The Squaw Man with William Faversham, The Great John Ganton with an up-and-coming actress Laurette Taylor in the cast and Getting A Polish with...

     as Grand Duke Michel
  • Emily Fitzroy
    Emily Fitzroy
    Emily Fitzroy was a British film actress who eventually became an American citizen. She made her film debut in 1915 and retired in 1944, with exactly 100 films to her resume...

     as Grand Duchess
  • Brandon Hurst
    Brandon Hurst
    Brandon Hurst was an English stage and film actor. He studied linguistics in his youth and began playing in theatre in 1880s. He was nearly fifty years old when he acted in his first film Via Wireless as Edward Pnickney in year 1915 and continued acting in the 129 other films until his death 1947...

     as Senator Alexei Karenin
  • Philippe De Lacy
    Philippe De Lacy
    Philippe De Lacy a.k.a. Philippe deLacy was a former silent film era child actor.-Early life:Born during World War I, the already fatherless Philippe lost his mother and five siblings when a German shell devastated the family home...

    as Serezha Karenin, Anna's Child
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