Product Details

• Actors: Greta Garbo, John Gilbert, George Fawcett, Emily Fitzroy, Brandon Hurst
• Directors: Jacques Feyder
• Format: Black & White, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: All Regions
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Warner Bros.
• DVD Release Date: June 22, 2009
• Run Time: 81 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B002EAYE4M
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #67,552 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Love" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The score for this classic silent will likely displease you, July 4, 2009

By 

calvinnme - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (TOP 50 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Love (DVD)

My rating for this film has to do with the product and the film, not with the wisdom of buying it here versus directly from Warner Bros for under twenty dollars. This is a Warner Archive product. It is a DVD-R made with the finest material Warner currently has available with no further restoration done. There are no chapter stops. You may only go forward or backwards in ten minute intervals.

This silent film has the famous lovers John Gilbert and Greta Garbo as Captain Count Alexei Vronsky and Anna Karenina, respectively. The two meet during a blizzard. Anna's carriage is detained because of it, and she has to stay the night in a nearby inn, with her travel there assisted by Count Vronsky. Her face has been covered up because of the blizzard, but once inside the inn she uncovers her face and Vronsky is instantly smitten. Even the maid at the inn feels the chemistry between the two and places Vronsky's and Anna's things in the same room, believing them to be married. There is one impediment to the pair's happiness though - Anna is married to a senator and has a son by him. Any spark that was ever there has gone out of the marriage, but Anna feels a duty to her station in life and above all, her son. Vronsky and Anna keep running into each other at government functions until they can no longer stop themselves, ultimately running off to Italy together. However, Anna has had to leave her son behind at the insistence of her husband, and soon she finds herself missing him. Once back in Russia, Vronsky's superior officer visits Anna and tells her that Vronsky will be thrown out of the service if the affair continues. She agrees to leave him if it will save Vronsky's career. There are two endings that were released with this film - a happy ending in America, and a sad one abroad. Here you are getting the happy ending.

The visual quality of the film is good, even if it is a bit soft looking. However, the deal breaker is probably the soundtrack. The score was recorded at a live performance, and the music chosen is good enough. However, the music was recorded at a college showing of this film. In any audience you would probably hear the occasional coughing in the background. Here, though, you'll hear loud laughter whenever the crowd finds something funny, and they apparently find something funny quite often and at the most inappropriate times, such as the first time Vronsky sees Anna's face and smiles at her. It just ruins the mood of the whole film. The audience was probably filled with teenagers with nothing better to do on this particular night.

I would highly recommend the film, but the price and especially the score and the "sound effects" will probably leave you feeling taken.

The film = 4/5
The presentation = 3/5 mainly because of the laughter in the soundtrack
I'll be kind and round up to 4 stars, but just be warned.

23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars OUTRAGEOUS AND DISGUSTING SOUNDTRACK, September 2, 2009

By 

Arbiter of Good Taste - See all my reviews

This review is from: Love (DVD)

Here is a copy of an e-mail I sent to Turner Classic Movies:

I recently purchased three Greta Garbo silent film DVDs through your Web site: "Wild Orchids," "Love," and "The Single Standard." Given the quality, the price of $17.99 - with no restoration whatsoever, and on discs that won't play on a computer - is outrageous. $9.99 might be more in line with the quality of the product, with the films lasting on average about 75 minutes. However, I am absolutely OUTRAGED at the audio track provided for "Love." It was recorded live at a showing of the film, apparently in Los Angeles, to an audience unfamiliar with the acting styles of silent films, that actors had to use facial gestures - sometimes exaggerated - to convey what they could not do with spoken words due to the technology of the time. Throughout the DVD of "Love" - which is the story of Tolstoy's "Anna Karenina" - audience laughter is heard, VERY loud and VERY clear, in the most inappropriate places. This is an affront to your customers, a disgrace to what I though TCM stood for, and a huge dishonor to two of MGMs greatest stars. Have you no respect for the icons of the past? Whoever decided to release this DVD with this audio track deserves to be fired. I suppose the chances of TCM ever preparing a DVD of "Love" with a proper soundtrack - even a simple solo synthesizer would be a vast improvement - fall under the category of "snowballs in hell." The next time I want a DVD of a film controlled by TCM, I'll search for someone who recorded it from TV and is selling it on the Internet. The price will be better and the quality certainly can't be worse. I repeat: I am utterly OUTRAGED.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gilbert and Garbo in LOVE, February 23, 2011

By 

EffieBelle - See all my reviews

This review is from: Love (DVD)

One criticism--and only one. The sound track could be better. The occasional laughter (live audience) in the background is annoying at times, but for Pete's sake, this film is more than a sound track; it's Gilbert and Garbo! It doesn't get any better than that. Gilbert is dashing, and his natural, playful sense of humor adds fun to an otherwise serious role. Garbo is beautiful and brilliant. If you compare this abridged version of "Anna Karenina" with the other "Anna Karenina" starring Frederick March, you'll see why I find "Love" so alluring. In "Love," Gilbert and Garbo sizzle. In "Anna Karenina," Garbo and March fizzle. Maybe that's because Garbo was in "Love" with Gilbert on and off screen. As far as I'm concerned, the superb acting makes up for the flawed musical score.