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Ramon Novarro and Greta Garbo in ‘Mata Hari’: The wrath of the censors (See previous post: "Ramon Novarro in One of the Best Silent Movies.") George Fitzmaurice’s romantic spy melodrama Mata Hari (1931) was well received by critics and enthusiastically embraced by moviegoers. The Greta Garbo / Ramon Novarro combo — the first time Novarro took second billing since becoming a star — turned Mata Hari into a major worldwide blockbuster, with $2.22 million in worldwide rentals. The film became Garbo’s biggest international success to date, and Novarro’s highest-grossing picture after Ben-Hur. (Photo: Ramon Novarro and Greta Garbo in Mata Hari.) Among MGM’s 1932 releases — Mata Hari opened on December 31, 1931 — only W.S. Van Dyke’s Tarzan, the Ape Man, featuring Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan, and Edmund Goulding’s all-star Best Picture Academy Award winner Grand Hotel (also with Garbo, in addition to Joan Crawford, John Barrymore, Wallace Beery, and...

Chicago – Audiences cry for many reasons other than sadness. They cry tears of joy, of amusement, of recognition…and of awe. When an artist manages to pull off a groundbreaking technical achievement never before brought to the big screen (or the stage, for that matter), it can elicit a response of overwhelming astonishment. Of course, in the age of digital overkill, such reactions are as rare as original scripts.

Watching Cohen Media Group’s unmissable Blu-ray release of Raoul Walsh’s 1924 masterpiece, “The Thief of Bagdad,” was an experience akin to witnessing the Broadway production of Julie Taymor’s “The Lion King” (which I was lucky enough to catch on a high school trip). The ingenious props and fluid choreography that allowed towering animals to suddenly materialize onstage during the opening “Circle of Life” number caused me to bawl out of sheer exhilaration, and the final, incredible moments of Walsh...

Rudolph Valentino, Agnes Ayres in George Melford's The Sheik Long before they became Hollywood's favorite terrorists, Arabs were generally portrayed as lusty, uncouth, infantile beings in myriad Hollywood movies. Turner Classic Movies returns this month with their annual "Race & Hollywood" film series. The "race" this time around: Arabs. Frank Lloyd's long but generally entertaining 1924 epic The Sea Hawk is almost over. TCM has shown this one before a few times; long-thought lost, The Sea Hawk was restored about a decade ago. Popular leading man Milton Sills stars. Next are two silents starring movie idols of the 1920s: The Thief of Bagdad (1924) and The Sheik (1921). One of Douglas Fairbanks' biggest hits, The Thief of Bagdad was directed by Raoul Walsh; this Arabian Nights romp is probably Fairbanks' most enjoyable vehicle of that era. Quite possibly, it's Fairbanks best movie, period. Starring Rudolph Valentino, who set as many hearts aflutter as Justin Bieber,...

Blood And Sand (1922) Direction: Fred Niblo Cast: Rudolph Valentino, Lila Lee, Nita Naldi, Rosa Rosanova, Walter Long, Charles Belcher, Leo White, Rosita Marstini Screenplay: June Mathis; from Vicente Blasco Ibáñez's novel, and Tom Cushing's play Recommended Rudolph Valentino, Nita Naldi, Blood and Sand Bullfighting has never appealed to me, so I approached Fred Niblo's Blood and Sand with caution. Now that I've seen it, I am relieved that there was no actual footage of this hideous blood sport. Niblo's film version of Vicente Blasco Ibáñez's novel and Tom Cushing's play offers more reference to the practice than any actual details. Rudolph Valentino dominates [...]...