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Wild Orchids

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MGM had Greta Garbo quite busy making films during 1928 and 1929 as the studio saw the approach of sound film possibly destroying one of their top assets. Nobody knew what the outcome of Garbo's career would be at the time.

Thus Greta Garbo made silents until 1930's "Anna Christie". This silent film is not really silent at all. It has a very sophisticated score for its time, including sound effects, crowd noises, and even singing during musical numbers, with long shots of the singers so you can't see that there is no true synchronization with the singers themselves.

The story is that of 50ish John Sterling (Lewis Stone) and his young wife, Lillie (Greta Garbo). The two are embarking on a cruise to Java so that John can mix business with pleasure. His business is to look over some plantations that he may buy. The pleasure is his desire to hunt and shoot a tiger while in Java. On the boat the couple meet Prince De Gace, played by Nils Asther. John is by no means a neglectful husband, but at age 50 he has largely left his romantic days behind him. This makes Lillie a likely target for the charming prince and his silver tongue. He makes a play for her right off the bat, and continues his chase as the Sterlings remain guests in his home. Lillie is torn, but tries her best to avoid the prince and his advances. One night during their stay, after returning from a day of looking at plantations, John sees the silhouettes of the prince and Lillie on the drawn shade of the house just after the prince has grabbed her for a quick kiss. Whatever will John do about this situation? Mix feelings of betrayal and jealousy with tigers and loaded guns and anything is possible.

The acting in this film is quite well done. Asther comes across well as the slimy but attractive prince, and Lewis Stone was a wonderful silent actor. His surprise when he first sees the couple in an embrace, and his look of both great disdain and knowing when he later sees the prince flirting with a servant girl says it all. Yet, like Garbo, some of his best performances would come with talking pictures where he could both artfully play the cad in the MGM precodes as well as Judge Hardy of the Andy Hardy series fame.

This is a Warner Archive product and is thus a DVD-R with no extra features. There are no chapter stops. You may only go forwards and backwards in ten minute increments. There has been no restoration of this film specifically for this release, but I must say that the film looks very good - among the best quality I've seen of MGM's late silent era films. Highly recommended for the silent film enthusiast.

This 1929 silent film is almost a "talkie" with its synchronized sound and fitting music, making it an interesting viewing experience, whether you are used to silent films or only 'talkies'. The sound effects are things like a cheering crowd, slamming doors and hand clapping, and the music is quite varied, according to the mood and scenes, such as Javanese natives performing their tribal dances (though it's not authentic Javanese music; only a Hollywood version of 'something exotic'!)
This aspect alone makes this silent film worth experiencing, but add to that the excellent performances by the principle players: Greta Garbo, the wife who longs for more romance and attention from her husband; Lewis Stone, the 'blind' husband who only has his business on his mind; and Nils Asther as the enigmatic Javanese prince who tries to seduce the neglected and frustrated wife.
Greta Garbo goes through many emotions, all of which she plays wonderfully, and each of the characters is solid and realistic. The story is, in fact, just like Erich von Stroheim's "Blind Husbands", only more detailed and sophisticated, and in a more exotic setting. Even if the storyline is familiar or somewhat simple, the actual telling of the story, the acting performances and visual -and audio! - experiences make up for it very nicely.

The Greta Garbo of the silent era is a fascinating creature to watch on screen in so many ways. Often during the late 20's playing a vamp, femme fatale, or adulterious wife her work in this early period makes a most interesting contrast to her later roles as the tragedy queen of MGM's glossy 1930's historical pieces and romantic melodramas. "Wild Orchids", coming from 1929 is what is called a "transitional talkie", meaning that it was one of the very last silent films produced and had sound effects incorporated into the sound track which makes for interesting viewing if only to witness first hand this very brief interlude in movie making before sound came fully in. Indeed Garbo was deliberately held back from talkies by MGM because of fears of what her accent would do to her loyal public's perception of her. "Wild Orchids", really can be viewed as the epitome of the lavishness expected from the legendary 1920's. Indeed the word "exotic", best sums up this production from the final period of the silent era that sees Garbo really in command of the screen in a tale of romance, infidelty, and revenge; the sort of melodrama that quickly went out of fashion once the 1930's and the depression got underway. Teamed with frequent co star veteran character actor Lewis Stone as her elderly husband and the handsome Danish actor Nils Asther as her Javanese lover Garbo still manages to command both the screen and the viewers attention with that very special screen presense that was uniquely her's.

Based on a story by John Colton, "Wild Orchids", opens with a ship ready to sail to Java and we are introduced to John Sterling (Lewis Stone), and his much younger wife Lillie (Greta Garbo). Later on we learn that the very joyful departure at the dock hides the fact that Lillie is a frustrated and neglected wife as John pursues all of his many business ventures. Lillie is joining John on this trip to Java in the hope it might make her more a part of John's life. On board the ship the Sterlings make the acquaintance of the Javanes Prince de Gace (Nils Asther), who is travelling back to his country. The Prince is instantly smitten with the beautiful Lillie and begins to pursue her. Lillie at this time is intent on keeping her marriage intact and she continually rejects the attentions of this handsome stranger. Becoming very friendly with John the Prince invites the couple to stay in his palace in Java from where John will travel out to inspect some tea plantations he intends to buy. Once staying with the Prince Lillie finds that John really views her presence on this business trip as a nuisance and no place for a woman. Lillie feels rejected and the exotic lure of Java begins to weave its magic between Lillie and the Prince. Lillie in a last attempt to get her husband's love dresses up in a magnificent Javanse costume she admired from one of the performances the Prince staged for their entertainment however when John abruptly orders her to take it off the way is open for the Prince to show his love for a more willing Lillie. The pair fall in love and begin an affair however things start to go wrong when they are all out on an exursion to some distant tea plantations and get caught in the rain and stop at one of the Prince's properties. After returning from one of his visits John learns of the pairs affair after seeing them together and he begins to plot his revenge. Having stated that he wants to go on a tiger hunt he urges the Prince to arrange one however he has an ulterior motive for wanting to go on it as he plans to try and kill the Prince. When a tiger is heard near their camp that evening John insists that the Prince come out with him in the dark to try and trap it. However once out in the jungle and in sight of the tiger the Prince discovers his gun has been tampered with and that he is at the mercy of the tiger. He is mauled by the animal and near death and Lillie manages to get him back to the camp. Regretting what he has done in his desire for revenge John gets the Prince back to the palace where he is cared for by the staff and begins to recover. Deciding to leave and guessing that Lillie in the light of what he has done would not want to return to the United States with him, John is surprised that Lillie does want to return and that her husbands love has always been what she has wanted. The pair reconcile and leave in the hope that despite what has happened they can work at repairing their marriage.

Everything about "Wild Orchids", despite the at times rather predictable story is the best that a major studio like MGM could offer. Garbo has never been more superbly displayed in her silent efforts than here as the frustrated wife of a much older man. It seems that no matter how predictable or absurb a story might be Garbo by her sheer effort and magnetism could make it work. While "Wild Orchids", is far from her best role she really adds so many extra elements to he rplaying to make thi swoman almost seem at times like a real person. Teamed with frequent co star Lewis Stone, he and Garbo despite the age difference always worked well together. Here as neglectful husband and lonely unfulfilled wife they have never been better together and Lewis Stone still best remembered as Judge hardy in the Andy Hardy series of films really shows his dramatic worth in the climatic tiger hunt revenge scene when he is pure evil in his jealousy over his wife's affair. Nils Asther was probably a strange choice to play a Javanese Prince but he does well as the seductive lover here and would go on to team with Garbo again in her next effort "The Single Standard" right at the end of the silent era. The production of "Wild Orchids", is of much interest in many ways most importantly for its extremely interesting synchronised sound effects that take the form of crowd noises, car horns, market scenes etc. Only really used in the early part of 1929 it is a rare experience to watch what is a silent film but one which has sound incorporated into it despite there still being no spoken dialogue. Another important relationship developed further with this film and that was Garbo's famed collaboration with MGM designer Adrian who here creates one of Garbo's most famous visual images of her entire career when she dresses in the gold lame Javanese outfit supposedly to arouse so passion in her husband. Garbo has never been more exotic than in this one brief scene on screen and it marked the start of a wonderfully creative working relationship between star and designer. Directed by veteran Sidney franklin "Wild Orchids", of course is very much a product of its time and might not appeal to all movie watchers however the films performances are lively and move along at a good pace. The slowly building elements of suspicion and then revenge are well handled by Sidney Franklin and despite the films rather too convenient "happy ending" it is guaranteed to hold your attention despite the films very long running time of just under two hours.

For all lovers of exotic screen melodramas and certainly for students of this closing period in Hollywood's silent era "Wild Orchids", makes fascinating viewing. Greta Garbo delivered a special kind of magic on screen even in her early days during the silent era and she has one of her best early roles here as the woman torn between her responsibilities as a wife and the passion she feels for the handsome young man paying her some much needed attention. Interest in alot of these early silent efforts seems to be reviving after many decades of neglect and thankfully we have preserved many of these early efforts by legendary performers like Greta Garbo. For a taste of Hollywood's idea of the "exotic", orient peopled with attractive individuals driven by passion "Wild Orchids", makes most enjoyable viewing and I recommend it to all fans of early Hollywood.

Greta Garbo in one of her very best silent films. Although she is for once not the tantalizing vamp of her earlier films,Miss Garbo never looked or acted more sensual than here. Watch out for the erotic climax between Nils Asther and her,this is definately great fun to watch

Barely turned 23 - Garbo had starred in Mauritz Stiller's "The Story of Gösta Berling" The Saga of Gosta Berling when she was still a teenager - and with ten leading roles already behind her, Greta Garbo started shooting MGM's "Wild Orchids" in the late Fall of 1928. The film is a dreadful concoction of hackneyed plots: the neglected young wife tempted by an exotic foreigner, with Garbo's Swedish compatriot Nils Asther cast as an immoral Javanese Prince! Yet surprisingly, "Wild Orchids" is quite an intimate film with just three roles, the film survives today because the actors - especially Garbo - make it work.

Lewis Stone, playing the December husband to Garbo's May bride, handles his role as Romantic foil with consumate smoothness; Stone's almost too good as the tired, boring businessman who overlooks his young wife. In vivid contrast emerges a Javanese prince - played by another recent Swedish arrival in Hollywood, Nils Asther - who bursts into the movie whipping his servant right outside his steamship cabin door, much to the horror of passing Garbo. One is instantly reminded of Gloria Swanson in von Stroheim's "Queen Kelly". Queen Kelly Seeing Garbo the cruel Prince instantly takes on a different, gentler persona, though his actions do not allay Garbo's disgust.

The story quickly becomes Garbo's struggle to find some connection with her boring and unobservant husband who is preoccupied with business matters, and the wicked but quite aroused with interest Prince. Viewed today Garbo's internal dilema, with its endless circling enticements and temptations, seems purest melodrama, but despite this Garbo still evokes for us a wonderful shared intimacy and in her candor wins us over to her authenticity. And what sublime grace exits between the three principals as they move about aboard ship, with Stone deftly managing his part to understated perfection, even as Asther's Prince assaults his wife Garbo's defences. At times this fluid graceful sense of musical motion becomes so insistent that Garbo and Asther find themselves dancing. Asther's archness is forgiven, both by us and Garbo, as the story of her romancing takes on a living breathing force.

Many small wonders exist in the filming by William H. Daniels, but I must mention the mirror shots taken in Garbo's stateroom. They in particular capture her in a pantomine of feelings and shifting thoughts so unobtrusively its nearly supernatural. The ease with which Daniels and Garbo work together - almost outside of the director's orb as they add one visual epipahny after another - will only grow in later films to moments of unsurpassed perfection. Perhaps because there's really so little going on - the big and sole event in the film, a tiger hunt - comes at the very end - along the way Garbo is free to tighrope lightly from side to side of her conundrum - finding her own sense of self as actress between the understated acting of Lewis Stone, as her much older husband who represents stuffy familar security, and the wild and heavily theatrical Nils Asther, as Javanese Prince, tugging and pulling her fascination with the exotic and unknown.

Master cinematographer Daniels captures so many of Garbo's slightest nuances, her astonishing gift for telling tiny gestures and shaded emphasis we can almost forgive the ghastly storyline and average direction. Cinematographer Daniels visuals enrichen the film in innumerable ways. The mere act of a character walking down a corridor becomes a statement. Garbo's haughty disdain on meeting Asther's Prince formally through he husband is completely subverted by the huge orchid she wears on her left shoulder, the film's symbol of exotic love. But Garbo is made into a actual flower by Daniels presenting her all aglow in a bath of moonlight, and his filming Garbo in her stateroom as dressing she elegantly streches and curves like a flower in a rippling breeze. Daniels' subtle adjustements of distance and marvelous lighting gives even the most common of the many tete-a-tetes a lightness common to only the best silents, a sense of freedom of movement largely lost with the coming of sound. Combined with the acting the cinematography rescues "Wild Orchids" from what could easily have been a deserved oblivion. To what extent one accepts these elements succeed in saving "Wild Orchids" is a purely personal estimate, and will vary widely among viewers today.

Among numerous small points - the steamship Garbo travels on with her husband to Asia sails through the Golden Gate - several years prior to the building of the bridge. People today, even native San Franciscans, rarely seem to realize that long before the famous red superstructure of the twin towers emerged in the gap between San Francisco and the Marin headlands, the expanse of water leading to the Pacific was named the Golden Gate. "Wild Orchids" also flaunts one of those superb long tracking shots so dear to silent film buffs - this at a Javanese banquet, the camera pulling back and back as the full length of the table is revealed. Sadly, for the most part director Sidney Franklin rarely finds much poetry in his film.

One dinner scene at the Princes has a company of Javanese dancers, local color brought in for the filming as half documentary, half dream sequence. At the close of the dance one sinuous woman dancer, arrayed in a stunning sensual costume twisting her limbs to kitschy pseudo-Asian music added to the silent score perfectly conjures up the voluptous world of the Prince. A short time later Garbo tries on a similar dress, a wildly exotic silk lame Javanese costume, complete with gilded headdress, ropes of carmine necklace beads, flared pointed shoulders, and golden slippers, all presages Garbo's famous outfit for "Mati Hari". Mata Hari Attempting to get a rise out of napping husband she's hugely disappointed. At this moment even the densest member of the audience realizes things are only going to heat up.

Though far from her best films, "Wild Orchids" offers up more than enough of Garbo to make the film a solid recommendation for her fans. I certainly much prefer watching a film like this, with all its flaws, to more 'successful' films that really leave nothing lasting. Garbo's presence in "Wild Orchids", as it name suggests, lingers in the memory like a rare perfume, one of those rare, impossible to describe haunting fragances only found in the rarest of wild orchids.