User Reviews

'Lady Windermere's Fan' is one of the great plays of Oscar Wilde, so it is curious to see it here as a big budget silent film from Warners Brothers. Starring May McAvoy and Bert Lytell as the Windermeres, with Irene Rich as Mrs Erlynne and a young Ronald Colman as Lord Darlington, this film is directed by Ernst Lubitsch, known mainly now for his stylish musicals and dramas from the sound era.

Despite the obvious drawback of not using any of Wilde's text, either spoken or as title cards, this adaptation does succeed in putting across most of the play's plot, just making a little tweak here and there to move the plot along or to bring matters to a satisfactory conclusion. Sets and costumes are of the jazz age and are beautiful, and McAvoy is a winsome Lady Windermere, all indignant eyes and little rosebud mouth.

The film however belongs to Irene Rich who portrays Mrs Erlynne as desperate, calculating, and everything in-between. She was a superb technician without overacting, and it's a pleasure to watch her. Ronald Colman as well shows signs of the star quality to come.

This 'Lady Windermere' is well worth watching.

I agree with the other reviewers that Lubitsch did a great job reworking parts of Wilde's play to make it suitable for silent film, and adding some of his signature touches. But I don't think the movie stands up to some of his later pieces, such as "Trouble in Paradise" and "Design for Living" (also reworked from a famous play, to good advantage). "Lady Windermere's Fan" is much more slow-paced, which can make it hard for a modern viewer, and not all of the characters are as interesting. However, the performances are good, especially the marvelous Irene Rich (whose high-fashion costumes are endlessly entertaining), the production values are high, and if you have the patience, you will be rewarded with some nice little bits of Lubitsch's social observation. It's interesting to consider how drastically attitudes toward male-female relations have changed over the decades: the film's plot depends on beliefs that have mostly, and rightfully, vanished. In contrast to convention, Lubitsch obviously enjoyed helping Rich create an older woman who was fascinating and sexually powerful.

At first it might not seem as if the combination of Ernst Lubitsch and Oscar Wilde would work very well, but this silent-screen adaptation of Wilde's "Lady Windermere's Fan" is both enjoyable and well-crafted. Instead of clashing, Lubitsch's stylish, mischievous approach and Wilde's perceptive cynicism complement each other. The characters and the story are Wilde's, the acting and the style are Lubitsch's.

Although the material is heavily re-worked from the original play, Lubitsch's decisions all seem to work pretty well. Wilde's witty and resourceful dialogue is gone, but his insightful portrayals of human nature remain. Lubitsch also makes good use of the camera to bring off some shots that could not have worked on the stage. In particular, at times he makes the fateful fan seem almost a full-fledged part of the cast.

This movie version features solid performances by May McAvoy and Bert Lytell as the Windermeres, with a youngish-looking Ronald Colman suitably ingratiating as Lord Darlington. But Irene Rich has the most interesting character, and as Mrs. Erlynne she also gives a fine performance that particularly stands out in her scenes with the other characters. She and Lubitsch both capture the nature of her unpopular but admirable character, while carefully setting up the contrasts and conflicts between her and the other characters, who are in general more socially acceptable but far less worthy.

This also works well simply as an entertaining, often very amusing, and sometimes dramatically compelling story. For most silent film fans, it would definitely be worth tracking down and watching.

An epigram-less silent screen version of Oscar Wilde by Ernst Lubitsch is likely to be a contest rather than a collaboration (and not surprisingly Lubitsch wins).

Irene Rich's handsome profile in the role of Mrs Erlynne provides a sight to savour throughout, and the race meet at which we see her from constantly switching viewpoints as people study her through their binoculars is one of the visual & cinematic highlights of the film.

When a stage play is turned into a movie the results can be dire, especially when the play is a dialog-driven comedy of manners, full of quips and epigrams. Unless it's handled carefully even a great play might come off as 'canned' and lifeless on screen, amounting to little more than what Alfred Hitchcock dismissed as "photographs of people talking." A few exceptions come to mind: The Philadelphia Story, the two versions of Holiday made in the '30s, the Rex Harrison/Margaret Rutherford Blithe Spirit, and a handful of other stage-to-screen adaptations that manage to be lively and entertaining despite heavy reliance on dialog. But these films are surpassed in achievement, in one sense at least, by an adaptation from 1925 which perfectly captures the spirit of the play it presents while scarcely quoting it!

Before seeing Ernst Lubitsch's silent version of Lady Windermere's Fan at the Museum of Modern Art this summer I re-read Oscar Wilde's play, which I enjoyed, but I didn't have high hopes for the movie, despite the involvement of a director I count among my favorites. I imagined the movie would consist of actors standing around in tuxes and evening gowns pretending to mouth witty sayings, which would then be presented to us in numerous title cards; but because I admire Lubitsch's sound films a great deal I thought I'd give it a try. Plus, I thought it'd be interesting to see Ronald Colman in a silent film, deprived of that wonderful voice. What a pleasant surprise to find that this is one of the best sophisticated comedies of the silent screen. The flavor of Wilde's play is distilled to its essence, and clearly conveyed without relying on a single one of his famous epigrams. (Interestingly, a recent biography of Lubitsch says that the film quotes only two or three lines from the play, but if so I didn't catch them.) How is this possible?

Lubitsch conveys Wilde's notions about high society swells and their prejudices cinematically, not verbally. When the notorious Mrs. Erlynne (Irene Rich) appears at the Ascot race track, the reaction of "society" is quickly made clear to us by the scandalized facial expressions of the ladies present; who, nonetheless, can't stop looking at her or talking about her. The tone of their remarks is obvious from their sour expressions. Naturally, the men are interested in Mrs. Erlynne, too. She is shown, montage fashion, from many different angles, through lorgnettes and binoculars, long-shot, extreme long-shot and close-up, and while the horse race is reduced to mere background. It's a funny and informative sequence, yet it isn't in Wilde's play at all. In another scene that more closely follows the text, Lord Darlington (Colman) calls on Lord and Lady Windermere at their home. He is formally announced, and pretends briefly that he actually came to see Lord Windermere on some minor matter. But when Windermere conveniently leaves on business, Darlington, shown in a stately long-shot, strides away from Lady Windermere (May McAvoy), sits, shoots her a sly look, and announces that he is in love with her. Shocked, she crosses and drops into a chair next to him. He rises, crosses away from her, and drops into a different chair. They both look miserable. Fade-out. It's a beautifully staged scene, and no additional dialog is necessary.

Another sequence that occurs late in the film perfectly epitomizes the famous Lubitsch Touch while deftly conveying the spirit of Wilde's play: a title card announces that "The relations between a man and a woman can be told by the way he presses her doorbell." Various ways in which this is so are then demonstrated. You wouldn't think that a close-up shot of a doorbell and a gentleman's gloved hand could be so suggestive, but Lubitsch manages to suggest a great deal.

The black & white cinematography of Lady Windermere's Fan positively shimmers; happily, this is one silent film that has been well preserved. The acting is quite restrained by the standards of the day, and even without his voice Ronald Colman has the presence of a star, while Irene Rich gives the performance of her career. It's a wonderful adaptation of a great play that can stand on its own as cinema; and it may come as a surprise to those who believe silent film comedy begins and ends with Ben Turpin and the Keystone Cops.

"Lady Windermere's Fan" is a master class in silent film adaptation by Ernst Lubitsch of Oscar Wilde's play of the same name. Bringing one of Wilde's works, which are justifiably renowned for their clever word play, especially the epigrams, to the silent screen seems an act of folly, but no filmmaker at the time, and perhaps since, had a better sense of visual wit than Lubitsch--an appreciation that extended to the entire withdrawal of Wilde's epigrams from this adaptation, to be replaced largely by the sort of amusing visual gags and situations of the sophisticated romantic comedy, which was then just emerging in cinema, such as in Lubitsch's prior "The Marriage Circle" (1924), and, more specifically, that evolved into the comedy of remarriage genre.

Despite Wilde's caustic wit putting high society in its place, so to speak, the resolution of the play was a product of the Victorian morals and age in which it was written, especially in regards to the role of women as faithful wives and mothers and nothing else. Not only did Lubitsch update it to the modern Roaring Twenties in the sense that there were now automobiles instead of horse-drawn carriages, but he likewise updated its lapses into moralism with a farce that's playful to the end. Additionally, instead of preserving the play's not-so-surprising revelation that Mrs. Erlynne is Lady Windermere's mother, it announces this in Edith Erlynne's first scene; consequently, allowing for much of the humor and intrigue to be restructured around the dramatic irony of the spectator knowing what the characters do not. The updating also remakes Edith into something of a vamp or a flapper, including her wardrobe distinguishing her from the high-society clique. And, although she wishes to join their ranks, so as to marry, she also seems to relish the attention her appearance as a deviant brings her, especially from the opposite sex. I also find it amusing how she recklessly tosses her cigarettes aside rather than placing them in the ashtrays that are always nearby (two subsequent adaptations, "The Fan" (1949) and "A Good Woman" (2004), contain more obvious jokes based on Mrs. Erlynne's smoking). Although Irene Rich as Edith appears fourth in the credits, including below the star-in-the-making Ronald Colman as Lord Darlington, the play's cad, this is Rich's picture. Behind the screen, they must've known this, too, as she steals the show down to the delightfully-altered ending, although the supporting cast is quite amusing, too.

While having the unduplicated distinction of being the most prestigious director in two nations, Germany and, then, the U.S., and in both the silent and sound eras, both critically and in terms of studio clout, it doesn't seem that Lubitsch receives as much appreciation nowadays as do some other filmmakers of his era. Regardless, his "touch" is evident here, from the smart adaptation, well-crafted pacing, grand set design and the peerless comedic timing. And, this was Lubitsch's picture, as Warner Bros. gave him the rare artistic freedom for studio productions, from story selection to final cut. The original racetrack scene is a brilliant series of looks, of binocular-masked point-of-view shots and reverse angles, as Lubitsch parodies society's busybodies cackling over the sight of Edith. Throughout the picture, this system of looks is repeated in scenes where characters peer out windows. At the end of the racetrack scene, there's also a creative shot of Edith passing an "Exit" sign, as Lord Lorton follows her and a wipe closes out the scene just at the right point. Another shot relies for its comedic effect on no camera movement or editing and entirely upon how Lady Windermere re-enters the shot as she debates whether to search her husband's desk drawer.

This would be a rich film to study for its more technical aspects alone: the editing, camera placement, production design, blocking. The garden scene in the party sequence is another good example of this--how the obscuring of the spectator's view of Lady Windermere and Lord Darlington's interaction adds comedic effect while that of Edith's interaction as witnessed by Lady Windermere compounds the dramatic irony. Additionally, Lubitsch was once derisively called the "director of doors" by Mary Pickford, due to their contentious collaboration on "Rosita" (1923), and there's good, if at first seemingly puzzling, reason for the moniker. I believe his emphasis on doors is the backbone of the films' pacing, the movement of the characters and the edits. Even though he insisted on always showing characters enter and exit every door, this film has a decent average shot length of 7.4 seconds, which is also surely helped by the sparing use of intertitles. And those title cards tend to add to the farce, such as the scene focusing on the relation of a gentleman to a lady being indicated by the manner in which he rings her doorbell, which is doubly humorous when considering the director's already-established fascination with the entryways, that he now is diving into their detail with doorbells. Even when a shot seems at first to linger needlessly on the sight of a door being opened and closed, such as when Lady Windermere leaves the garden, it serves a purpose; in that case, it anticipates Edith's following her. It also helps that the doors tend to be absurdly gigantic, with doorknobs sometimes reaching near faces. The enormous sets in general, when aided by well-timed long-shot framings, add literalism to the satirical smallness of the characters amid high-handed society and personal shortcomings.

It's also notable that Lubitsch and company also adapted a 1916 version of the same story and reworked some of its alterations in "opening up" what was originally a three-sets and four-acts play. Film historian Charles Musser goes into some detail comparing the two in the essay, "The Hidden and the Unspeakable: On Theatrical Culture, Oscar Wilde and Ernst Lubitsch's Lady Windermere's Fan." The 1916 film, however, is primitively filmed from distant camera positions, bogged down by wordy title cards, with histrionic acting and more moralizing than even in Wilde's original, but without the satire. This 1925 iteration improves on all of this: an intricate use of the camera based on looks--what characters see and misbelieve they see--, nuanced performances that are allowed to display the registering of character thoughts though a more intimate camera and a pacing that is patient and yet remains energetic, lush settings and aided by the translating of the written witticisms into visual wit.

Mrs Erlynne, the mother of Lady Windermere - her daughter does not know about her - wants to be introduced in society, so that she can marry Lord Augustus Lorton. Lord Windermere, who helped her with a cheque, invites her to his wife's birthday-party, but Lady Windermere thinks, she has reason to be jealous, so she decides to leave her husband and go to Lord Darlington, who is pining for her.

This should be a slam dunk, a script from Oscar Wilde directed by Ernst Lubitsch. But as others have pointed out, Lubitsch humor required a little bit more... the talking helps the wit get across, and the general feel here just is sort of jerky.

What scores are available I do not know. The version I watched had the same sort of piano riff played over and over again. It worked, and was far better than watching it in silence (true "silent" films are obnoxious) but it seemed lacking, and I imagine much more could have been done with the right organ music.

Perhaps only Ernst Lubitsch could have created this masterpiece, a play by one of the world's greatest users of words turned into a silent motion picture.

I remember seeing this at the late and very lamented Silent Movie Theatre on Fairfax in Los Angeles, in the 1970s. And I remember marveling then how Lubitsch was able to create such a magnificent work.

Yes, he had the help of superlative actors -- May McAvoy's performance was truly a revelation -- and of course had the basic Wilde play as well as Julien Josephson's adaption, but it's his camera placement and where the actors performed that make this such a wonder.

I cannot recommend too strongly this "Lady Windermere's Fan," but when you go to YouTube, be careful to check out the various editions before you settle down to watch. One is terrible, but the one I saw is great. Worthy of a great movie.

Nobody was as savvy about the intricacies of the human heart as Lubitsch, and of how virtue is never an absolute.

This warmly empathetic, highly sophisticated gem is an adaptation of Oscar Wilde, with virtually none of the play's dialog utilized, but as suggestive and outrageous as Wilde himself, conceived, framed and edited as pure cinema.

From the exact same period as Cecil B. DeMille's infinitely more crass sex comedies and Charles Chaplin's equally brilliant and morally ambiguous 'The Woman of Paris', but carried by an indistinguishably European sensibility. Irene Rich as the woman who sacrifices herself in secret is impossibly glamorous and subtle, May McAvoy is truly heartbreaking as the socialite suspicious of her husband's philandering, but Ronald Colman, alas, is left with nothing much to do except smolder sexily at the fringes with those impertinently raised eyebrows.

A highlight is the Ascot game, a marvel of choreography and mime, a delicious baiting of upper class hypocrisy.

Ernst Lubitsch was a great director with many wonderful films, his early work (his German silents) is more interesting than great but when he hit his stride from the late-20s onwards his very distinctive directing style sparkled at its best. Oscar Wilde was a tremendously influential, perceptive and subversive writer, his work having much drollness and bite. Have for a long time appreciated silent films highly, while there are ones that don't hold up the ones that have are very good and the best landmarks.

'Lady Windermere's Fan' is an interesting Wilde play. It is not one of my favourite works of his, 'The Importance of Being Ernest', 'The Selfish Giant' and 'The Picture of Dorian Grey' connect with me more and am more familiar with them too, but it is unmistakably Wilde in characterisation and prose. This 1925 film adaptation is great on its own terms and even if Lubitsch went on to do even better later 'Lady Windermere's Fan' is by far one of his best and most interesting silent films (and to me one of his first great films).

Don't expect a film that is one hundred percent faithful to the source material. As said, there is a lot of heavy re-working. Not that that is a bad thing, it makes no difference to me actually, but it is merely a word of warning for anybody that thinks the opposite. It also feels more Lubitsch than Wilde, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Absolutely love Lubitsch's directing style, very much in full display, which is full of wit, sophistication and irony.

While Wilde's typically perceptive depiction of humanity and its nature and the insightful approach to his characters remain, there isn't quite enough of his own wit and subversiveness. There is absolutely evidence of them and the two styles generally don't clash surprisingly, but Lubitsch's directing makes more of a splash here.

Visually, 'Lady Windermere's Fan' looks great. Very sumptuously designed and costumed and there are some stylish shots that are expansive enough to avoid it from feeling too much of a filmed play or too claustrophobic. Lubitsch's direction is clever and elegant throughout, no rough around the edges feel or any signs of disinterest. It is very well performed and with more subtlety than a fair share of silent films from this period, with the best performance coming from Irene Rich as the most interesting character. She really does lighten up the screen.

All the conflicts are done with tension but also in a witty and sophisticated fashion, and the actors interact very naturally, no stiffness or disconnection here. The story is fun and charming, any harshness in the conflict done with bite and nuance. It goes at a lively enough pace, helped by that Lubitsch doesn't take the material too seriously, and doesn't get bogged down by staginess or over-reliance on anything that could potentially deaden the pace (i.e. title cards). The characters are interesting and Wilde's perceptive approach towards them is maintained.

On the whole, great. 9/10

I'm not familiar enough with Oscar Wilde's play to able to comment on the film as an adaptation, but on its own merits there's much to enjoy about 'Lady Windemere's fan.' Preservationists have done fine work, and Charles Van Enger's crisp cinematography hasn't lost any hint of its quality, nor Ernst Lubitsch's sharp direction and editing. Thanks to these contributions we can see all the fine detail and hard work that was poured into the production, including terrific costume design, hair and makeup work, and set design and decoration. The cast all give fine performances to realize their characters - not specifically slanted toward comedy, but embracing the personalities and moods of the roles and letting the course of events speak for itself. It's rather hard to spotlight one actor over another, because at varying points they all impress, illustrating excellent nuanced range and poise. Although, with all this having been said, the casting of Irene Rich and May McAvoy are interesting choices, as a small additional layer of suspension of disbelief is necessary to accept that one is supposed to be the other's mother when there are only 8 years between them in real life.

Perhaps more substantively, Julien Josephson's adapted screenplay is a minor joy, and the writing is quite strong. There's nothing about 'Lady Windemere's fan' that leaps out so much as to demand praise, yet it's all-around solid. Characters are filled with plentiful little complications, both in and of themselves and in relation to each other, that do so much to build the drama. Factor in misunderstandings, lack of communication, humiliations, and the haughtiness of a judgmental society, and the stage is set for an engaging, fruitful narrative. The scene writing is rich and mindful as it capitalizes on the great acting of the ensemble, and weaves in notable subtleties to keep the feature all the more enticing and compelling. For that matter, though not a wholly essential element, there are many instances herein where Lubitsch's very shot composition lends much to the conveyance of the story; carefully considered, the fundamental visualization of some scenes can speak volumes in a moment, and so it is here.

Compared to other works of Wilde as a playwright, or Lubitsch a filmmaker, this title declines utmost farcical energy or outright laughs. The comedy in this case is the type borne of the roiling complexities, expectations, and foibles of the characters, but there are no explicit jokes or gags to accentuate it. As a result, a measure of drama is stirred into the plot as some beats are distinctly awkward or - from a place of empathy - sad, or infuriating. Yet it all comes together into a complete story that's entertaining, and satisfying, and even quietly rewarding. If not the most immediately grabbing picture, 'Lady Windemere's fan' nonetheless bears a spark of heartfelt humanity and brilliance that lets it shine brightly even almost 100 years later. Not every movie can claim a like degree of enduring value, so it's all the more gratifying that this holds up and is worth checking out after so much time. If you have the opportunity, these are 90 minutes that are very deserving of one's time.

In "Lady Windermere's Fan" the great Ernst Lubitsch may have bitten off a bit more than he can chew. First and foremost, how can you reproduce Oscar Wilde's witty dialogue in a SILENT FILM?? True, the famous 'Lubitsch touch' is apparent, but minus Wilde it becomes a romantic drama.

The players are excellent and above reproach, in particular Irene Rich as Mrs. Erlynne - in fact, it is basically her picture. A youthful Ronald Colman as Lord Darlington underplays his role but is urbane and charming (in truth, I have not read or seen the play before but that is my perception). I have always liked Colman in everything I have seen him in, but, of course, you can't hear his marvelous voice and diction here.

Despite these drawbacks I enjoyed the film and felt the photography was exceptionally good. I just felt it would have been even better with a soundtrack, as it lacks the requisite bite and panache.

Sadly, a drawing room comedy of manners such as "Lady Windermere's Fan" wouldn't work today, as modern day audiences would be baffled by the subtlety and lack of action. That may be why it hasn't been remade successfully in the sound era. I give it a rating of 7.

I think Lady Windermere's Fan is one of the key silent films of Ernst Lubitsch. Not because I like it (I like it a lot) but because of what it means for Lubitsch and the kinds of movies he obviously wanted to make. It's an adaptation of the play by Oscar Wilde, and it's a silent film. Do you adapt Oscar Wilde into silent films? Isn't the point of an Oscar Wilde play the witty banter? Well, Lubitsch and his main writer Julien Josephson approached this adaptation knowing full well that they weren't going to be able to capture much, if any, of that banter, and they actually adapted the material for the medium of silent film. Approaching it primarily as a character piece, they found a surprising amount of emotion to mine and effectively brought it to the screen.

Lady Windermere (May McAvoy) is happily married to her husband Lord Windermere (Bert Lytell) despite the unwanted advances of Lord Darlington (Ronald Colman), a young bachelor with designs on the married woman. This is a minor issue compared to the threat of scandal when an older woman, Mrs. Erlynne (Irene Rich) shows up with proof that she is Lady Windermere's mother, a woman the young bride thought had been dead since she was a child. In order to protect his wife's perception of her own mother, instead of the scandalous nature of the real woman who showed up in London one day, Lord Windermere decides to buy her off with regular payments of fifteen hundred pounds at a time.

This money allows Mrs. Erlynne to establish herself unsteadily in London society. She may be a married woman of questionable virtue untied to any man and with unexplained wealth, but she has the wealth and can show up at public events like horse races no matter what the nattering group of gossips say. The gossips, a trio of elderly women, is the main source of comic relief in the film. They have two major appearances, the first at the horse race and the second at Lady Windermere's birthday party, and Lubitsch frames them in such entertaining fashion that they are just outright funny every time they come on screen. The trio of women may be unserious ninnies, but they do represent the opinion of society, and Mrs. Erlynne cannot fully establish herself or even fully accept the romantic interests of the bachelor Lord Augustus Lorton (Edward Martindel) if society doesn't embrace her as one of their own.

The main tension in the film is around the secretive nature of the relationship between Lord Windermere and Mrs. Erlynne. He's funding her, taking taxis to get to her residence, and showing every sign that he's having an affair with the woman, signs that Lady Windermere steadily picks up on, her suspicions growing as her birthday party comes closer. When Mrs. Erlynne insists on being invited to Lady Windermere's birthday party with the plan on revealing herself to her daughter, Lord Windermere accepts but has to rescind the invitation when his wife finds out. Mrs. Erlynne refuses to accept the declination and shows up anyway, showing herself to be a witty and comfortable entry into London high society (this is the one place where I miss the Wilde dialogue the most), despite Lady Windermere's threats to her husband to slap Mrs. Erlynne across the face with her fan.

The ending of the film involves all of our main characters, after the party, descending at different times into a single, scandalous location. My most consistent complaint about Lubitsch's lesser endings has been how quickly they happen, how quickly everything gets wrapped up and, often, end up with clashing tones that he doesn't manage all that well. That's absent completely here as the last twenty minutes are completely dedicated to wrapping up the story in a juggle of characters and their motives, changing emotions, and even some solid hints of irony. It's also a source of unexpected pathos as Mrs. Erlynn's reasons for her disappearance get a final act explanation previously denied to us, but rather perfectly placed for where it needs to be in order to draw parallels with herself and her daughter about to, perhaps, jump into some rash action.

Now, let me talk about intertitles for a second. Intertitles were the single major flaw of silent films. Silent films hinge on visuals and montage to convey information, and breaking that up with a black screen with text on it is a breaking up of the magic that is pure cinema. Most of the best silent films have minimal intertitles (think The Passion of Joan of Arc or Sunrise), trusting on the audience to pick up most of the information while designing the film to be told in the specific ways that silent film was strong doing. This is why I was surprised at both Lubitsch adapting an Oscar Wilde play as well as how well it comes off. We don't get much of the wittiness of the original play in terms of dialogue, but the emotional core of the story is retained. We also find new ways to be funny that don't rely on talking, in particular around the presentation of the three gossips. The wit hasn't been removed, but it has been modified to fit the form. It's an intelligent adaptation that works quite well.

That being said, I do think the film loses a bit of something in not having the witty dialogue present. Characters are well built here, but it's obvious that there's more entertainment to be had if people were actually exchanging witticisms back and forth. It's my only real complaint, that while the adaptation is done well, it can't quite completely overcome what's in the original through its best efforts. The film has to rely on its ability to create characters and situations the silent-film way, and it does those very well. That issue is only really an issue, I think, through the first hour or so. It doesn't make anything bad, but there's a certain distance in the first hour that prevents some direct connection with the characters.

However, the ending is great, and I love it.

This is Lubitsch's best film so far in his career. That it falls just shy of greatness is a tad disappointing, but he really did the best with what he had.