Customer Reviews

Romance [VHS]

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

leonard Maltin can really be off the wall at times and his panning of this movie is another example.In this, Garbos 2nd talkie we see her in classic form.Her 1st talkie Anna Christie seems technically crude and could use better casting. Now we jump to this film and we have classic Garbo.This is one of her underated and better films. Someone said she never played an ordinary person,here she is cast as a famous opera star.A glamorous role added to her glamour seems only right.There is a sense that now she feels at home in the talkies.Some may feel script is melodramatic but it is an intelligent one non the less.So if your a Garbo fan and havent seen this, your in for a treat.

Finally this film has been released on DVD. This is the first opportunity that I have ever had to view it. In many ways, the plot is a precursor of Camille though no where near as good. Garbo is an Italian Opera singer with a "past" who falls in love with a young pastor and gives him up in the end. Her co star Gavin Gordon is no heart throb which takes away from the plot. Just what does she see in him ?? Swedish Garbo does an Italian accent in her second talkie which is intriguing. It's a must for Garbo Fans but for the general film viewer it would be of little entertainment.

A very underrated Greta Garbo classic, one of Garbo's greatest movies! Greta Garbo is one of the most captivating and mesmerizing screen legends of all time, with each movie Garbo is endlessly fascinating. Romance is a hidden gem and I highly recommend it to any Garbo fan, or any fan of classic cinema!

This film is a perfect vehicle for Greta Garbo and she does a fine job with her role as an opera singer, a woman saved by her beauty and talent but psychologically haunted by her past. However, the one great flaw in this film is the casting of Gavin Gordon as Garbo's love interest, the minister. Gordon was by no means a bad actor but the chemistry between him and Garbo is somehow missing. One really is hard pressed to understand her attraction to him. Otherwise, "Romance" could have been as compelling as "Camille" because Garbo plays much the same part, a gorgeous but tainted lady. Strangely, Garbo has more chemistry with her middle-aged long-time lover and protector, played by the wonderful Lewis Stone, an actor who cannot be other than charming in any role and who later gained great fame as Judge James Hardy in the "Andy Hardy" film series. Yet, inexplicably, Garbo's character is dispassionate toward him and he toward her, even though they remain friendly. It's my opinion that, if the role of Stone had been written a bit differently, with him showing more feeling for Garbo and she realizing what he has meant to her, "Romance" could really have earned its title and the film could have been saved from the blah and disappointing ending that is a movie's doom. It looks to me like someone was shying away from a meaningful May-December liaison, even though Lewis Stone had already played Garbo's husband in the silent "Wild Orchids", in which she loved him very much.

Being a great "Garbo-Fan", I was really disappointed in this film. Not for a minute did I believe the "love story" between Rita and the minister. Everything seemed much too forced. Enjoy her as "A woman of Affairs" or "Camille" - I think she did not do herself a favour in accepting this role.