A Woman of Affairs (1928)
Directed by Clarence Brown

Film Review

Michael Arlen's provocative 1924 novel The Green Hat became one of the most scandalous Broadway plays of the 1920s before finding its way on the big screen, tamed and tempered as A Woman of Affairs.  With the more lurid aspects of Arlen's racy novel excised or at least toned down to a significant degree, the film adaptation ends up being a fairly run-of-the-mill melodrama, although with Greta Garbo breezing in at the height of her powers as the lead character it can hardly be called dull.  After Flesh and the Devil (1926), the film that made Garbo's name in Hollywood, Clarence Brown teams up with the actress for a second time, along with Garbo's favourite cinematographer William H. Daniels and her off-screen lover John Gilbert.

Perhaps too conscious of how it would be received by the censor, A Woman of Affairs has far less passion than other Garbo vehicles of this time but it is stylishly shot and its lacklustre screenplay is redeemed by some compelling performances from a distinguished cast.  Garbo is, as ever, mesmerising as the misjudged heroine who is tortured by an unattainable love, and Douglas Fairbanks Junior gives one of his better performances as a man gradually succumbing to alcoholism.  Gilbert only comes into his own in the last third of the film, and by now it is clear that Garbo has overtaken him as MGM's leading light.  Just as their off-screen romance was dwindling, so their on-screen pairings looked increasingly frosty and awkward.  This actually works to the film's advantage and lends an added poignancy to Garbo's performance - the one great romance of her life is over, and she knows it.  Clarence Brown would later have the honour of directing Garbo in her first sound feature, Anna Christie (1930) and subsequently Anna Karenina (1935).

Film Synopsis

English aristocrat Diana Merrick has been in love with Neville Holderness since they were children but the latter's father forbids their marriage and insists that Neville gives her up so that he can make his fortune in Egypt.  Diana ends up marrying David Furness, the best friend of her brother Jeffy, who regards him as a model of virtue.  Still faithful to Neville, Diana is unable to tell her husband she loves him, and he ends up killing himself, for reasons that are unclear.  When Diana next meets Neville, he is engaged to another woman, Constance.  Realising she has lost her one hope of happiness, Diana falls dangerously ill, and only Neville has the power to save her...