Greed (1924) - Von Stroheim's legendary, groundbreaking epic

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An eerie, vampire-like hand stretched through darkness for money makes up this stirring poster for Erich von Stroheim's Greed

The extroverted miner McTeague becomes an apprentice with a traveling dentist and falls for one of his customers, whom he marries, just as she happens to win 5,000 $ in the lottery. But in the following years their relationship gets devoured by greed and abuse.

 

Greed is written by great Austrian-born American filmmaker, co-writer/co-producer/director/co-editor Erich von Stroheim (Blind Husbands (1919)), with Joseph Farnham (Thunder (1929)) and June Mathis (The Man Who (1921)) making minor contributions, adapting McTeague: A Story of San Francisco (1899) by Frank Norris (The Third Circle 1909).

Stroheim's notorious epic has three phenomenal performances in the leads: Gibson Gowland (A Stranger in Town (1943)) as McTeague, Zasu Pitts (Spring Tonic (1935)) as wife Trina and Jean Hersholt (Reunion (1936)) as McTeague's friend Marcus Shouler. It also has several good scenes that arrive as pearls on a string. They are directed with extraordinary panache and foresight, utilizing locations to great effect.

Very regrettably huge parts of Stroheim's original film has been lost, not least since the lost reels apparently contained subplots that would have added nuances to the gloomy portrait of man that meets the audience in Greed. As the film stands now, both on screens and in the historic annals and analyses about it, the legends of Greed, its creation, Stroheim's obsessions and the film's afterlife, is at least as good and fascinating as the film itself.

Related post:

Erich von Stroheim: La Grande Illusion (1937) - Renoir's high-flying anti-war smash (co-star)

 

Watch 2 minutes of exerpts from the film here

Cost: 611k $

Box office: 274k $

= Mega-flop (returned 0.44 times its cost)

[Greed premiered 4 December (New York) and runs 140 minutes/239 minutes (Turner Entertainment's 1999 reconstructed version using stills). Stroheim had been fired from Universal Pictures prior to making a new, liberal deal with The Goldwyn Company, which also promised him 30k $ for a completed film and allowed him to head out and shoot the film on location. Shooting took place from March - October 1923 in California, including Los Angeles and San Francisco. The studio agreed to double the film's budget just three days into shooting. Stroheim had worked himself to exhaustion and collapsed days into shooting, but then recuperated and finished the film. Especially its 2-months long Death Valley shoot in conditions of extreme heat and lack of comforts are notorious; collapses from heat exhaustion would occur daily, and 14 cast and crew members became ill and left, including Hersholt, who spend a week in the hospital with internal bleeding: He still later called this the best role of his career. During the shoot in the mine, Stroheim famously insisted that it be done at 3,000 feet (900 meters) below ground for realism, although the setting was the same at 100 feet (30 m). When shooting ended after nearly 200 days, Stroheim had shot 85 hours of film or what comes to more than 52 times the length of the film that his contract stipulated that he should deliver. Stroheim's first cut of the film ran 42 reels or 8+ hours, and just 12 people saw it, with 3 of them agreeing it was the greatest film ever made. His next cut was 24 reels, around 5 hours, intended to be shown over the course of two nights; but simultaneously the studio was editing a shorter version. Goldwyn Company then merged with Metro Pictures, putting Stroheim's Universal nemesis Irving Thalberg in charge of the film, and Stroheim eventually ended in a fight, where Stroheim got punched in the face by Louis B. Mayer, who disliked the film. It was cut to 10 reels and added title cards that were much contended. The whole editing debacle hurt Stroheim profoundly. Metro Goldwyn Pictures Corporation spent 65k $ on advertising, - not much considering the film's relatively high cost. Critics were split, but many were mainly offended by the film's realism and thought it sordid. It grossed 227k $ (82.8 % of the total gross) in North America. The lost original Stroheim cut of the film has been called the 'holy grail' in cinema; though several legends are around about its possible whereabouts, it has never been found. The 1999 reconstruction cost 100k $ to assemble. Roger Ebert has given the film a 4/4 star review, translating to a notch over this one. Stroheim returned with The Merry Widow (1925). Gowland returned in The Phantom of the Opera (1925); Pitts in Sunlight of Paris (1924); and Hersholt in Cheap Kisses (1924). Greed is fresh at 96 % with a 9.30/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Greed?