Anna Karenina (1935)

Directed by Clarence Brown. Starring Greta Garbo, Fredric March, Basil Rathbone, May Robson, Maureen O’Sullivan, Freddie Bartholomew, Reginald Owen, Reginald Denny, Phoebe Foster.

Garbo already played Tolstoy’s doomed married socialite once before (1927’s Love), now she does it with sound, a step-up in production details and technical credits, and another inferior scene partner (previously John Gilbert, now Fredric March). I suspect March is closer to the Count Vronsky as imagined, but he’s less tortured than phlegmatic, with reserves of stoicism stifling his passions; Garbo, of course, knew how to float on still waters while turbulence raged behind her remote, porcelain features. This simplified adaptation focuses almost exclusively on the illicit love affair and the negative reactions it inspires, and director Clarence Brown seems disinterested in developing the tragedy’s inciting factors—why shouldn’t Anna submit to love’s embrace when we hardly understand the complexities of Czarist sociopolitics, we feel nothing for her husband (played by Basil Rathbone, who hits one note quite well, but doesn’t bother to hit any others) or the child she adores so much…but, then, who could make Freddie Bartholomew worthy of adoration? The prestige, the camerawork, and the Swede win out in the end, however. Produced by David O. Selznick.

69/100