Jackson Booth-Millard I found this silent film in the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, back in its day it was the most expensive film made, billed as the "first million-dollar movie" to come out of Hollywood, originally it was meant to be over 6 hours long, I watched the 2-and-a-half-hour version, directed by Erich von Stroheim (Greed). Basically set after the First World War, in Monte Carlo, a man is posing as Count Wladislaw Sergius Karamzin - Captain 3rd Hussars Imperial Russian Army (Erich von Stroheim) in order to take advantage of unsuspecting women and citizens. With the help of his partners in crime, his two mistresses "Princess" Vera Petchnikoff (Mae Busch) and "Her Highness" Olga Petchnikoff (Maude George), he attempts to seduce rich women to extort money from them. Count Karamzin begins scamming the unworldly wife of an American envoy, Helen Hughes (Miss DuPont), he starts to charm her, despite her husband being close by. Helen is easily impressed by his faux-aristocratic glamor, to the humiliation of her dull but sincere husband, the new U.S. ambassador. Karamzin also has his eye on two other women, hotel maid Maruschka (Dale Fuller), and mentally disabled Marietta (Malvina Polo), daughter of one of his criminal associates (Cesare Gravina), seeing them both as easy sexual prey. Maruschka is seduced and abandoned, in jealousy she goes mad and sets fire to a building in which Karamzin and Mrs Hughes are trapped, Karamzin jumps and saves himself, leaving Helen behind, her husband saves and looks after her. Karamzin's public display of cowardice means his reputation is damaged, he is shunned from high society, he is humiliated, so attempts to restore his pride by seducing Marietta. In the end, Karamzin gets his just desserts, the disabled girl's angered father kills him, dumping his body in the sewer, while the "cousins" are arrested for being imposters and con-artists. Also starring Rudolph Christians as Andrew J. Hughes and Al Edmundsen as Pavel Pavlich the butler. It is a simple enough story about corruption and sexual obsession, a fake "count" swindling rich women, the pace may be uneven by today's standards, and the plot and acting styles are not perfect, but it still has interesting moments, and the casino, hotel, café and boudoir locations look good, overall it is a reasonable silent drama. Worth watching!

Jamie Ward When it comes to the world of cinema, there has never been and probably never will be a bigger villain to make an impact on the screen more than that of—cue ominous stinger—the studio executive. Our oft belittled and antagonised hero, the auteur-director-genius, fights for his art to survive the relentless scissors which hack and cut and simplify and malign his soul's innermost-visions, his heart's dismays and his head's vitriol at a world which sneers at the misunderstood, holier-than-thou artist. The villains play their part well, and live up to their reputations in more cases than not. However, when watching Foolish Wives, one can't help but feel that maybe roles have been reversed for a short while. Erich von Stroheim writes, directs and stars in his first "grand vision" of a film which somewhat fittingly focuses on a leading character with no likable qualities or redeeming features. In the majority of other films, he would be the villain. Unlike Lon Chaney in 1920s gangster flick The Penalty however, this doesn't make the rest of Stroheim's bloated film interesting or in any way enjoyable. Watching the movie now, with a mere 140 minutes of footage salvaged from the original six hours, it's plain to see why most of the movie was mercilessly cut to ribbons. Often laboriously indulging in his own elaborate sets and painfully uninteresting characters (with the exception of his own), the film goes on and on, only briefly doing something interesting before succumbing back to mundane trivialities that go nowhere slowly. Stroheim does a fair job at portraying his character as dutifully repugnant as was obviously his intent, and his cast of supporting actors and actresses hand in commanding performances when called upon. But in building this self-indulgent attack on what he saw as European hypocrisy, the director comes off as a bit of a sham himself; talking loudly and endlessly about next to nothing of any real significance other than as a means to stroke his own fragmented ego. The moral of the story? The cutting room floor isn't always where genius and art dies. Sometimes it's where overweight, needlessly self-important films go to heaven. There's probably a decent film here, but it was lost in the seventies, not in the twenties.

framptonhollis Without a doubt, "Foolish Wives" is one of the biggest surprises when it comes to the quality of a film. When I was about a half hour into the film, I wasn't particularly enjoying it all. The sets were nice, Erich Von Stroheim was, obviously, pretty great, and it certainly wasn't boring, but there wasn't much happening. Well, now that I've seen the entire film I can confirm that by the time it all ends, a whole lot has sure happened!Mixing various elements of humor, drama, and suspense, Stroheim invents a true one of a kind masterpiece, a true silent era gem. If your bored during the early stages of "Foolish Wives", don't give up because it truly is an epic picture!When reflecting on the experience of viewing "Foolish Wives", certain scenes certainly do come to mind. Scenes like the huge storm that Stroheim's character gets stuck in and has to find his way out of, or the grand fire sequence towards the end, which I would hate to spoil (just let me tell you, it is truly spectacular and thrilling to watch).The characters are certainly unlikable at times, but that doesn't mean they aren't entertaining or even funny to watch be their awful selves every now and then. No matter how repulsive Stroheim's character manages to be at times, I still always wanted to see more of him, because he really does bring in a lot of the true entertainment value.Other than the excellent story and characters, I absolutely loved "Foolish Wives" for being a technical masterwork, with it's grand set design, cinematography, and filmmaking techniques. This is no bland silent film, this is a marvel of moving and breathtaking style. The previously mentioned storm and fire sequences are made exceptionally well made, giving the film a more grand and epic feel.I'd recommend this film for anybody willing to sit through something like it because, in the end, it really is one spectacular watch.

Mart Sander Sure thing, you can smell the big bucks, but that's not a thing to automatically make a good film. The location shots are great and the story is mildly interesting, but... there are no likable characters or even characters you could identify with. Stroheim could have been seductive and sexy, but bluntly he's too ugly to really pass as a notorious heart breaker. He doesn't look noble, seductive or gallant, but just plain arrogant and fake. (Let's not forget that just like this character, the real "von Stroheim" was quite a similar fake in real life.) It's hard to imagine why any woman would fall for him, even when the woman in question is as dull and uninteresting as Miss Dupont. It's all on the surface: the characters are even more black and white than the film, and even though most of them act sensibly, there is no real depth written into the script. Thank God we only have the 108 minutes version instead of the original (reported) 6 + hours! I doubt if there was any significant character development there. The story is highly moralizing, even though this could have been something that Hollywood producers threw in at some point. Not a bad film, but something that keeps you at a distance and never allows to really become part of it. Probably one of the first films to fixate the enduring Hollywoodian image of Russians as the bad guys.