Blind Husbands (1919)
Directed by Erich von Stroheim

Film Review

By the time he embarked on his filmmaking career in 1919 with Blind Husbands Erich von Stroheim was already an established actor in Hollywood, albeit one who was hopelessly typecast as the villainous Hun.  In his most recent film, The Heart of Humanity, he famously threw a screaming baby out of a window whilst raping a woman.  He was never going to end up a matinee idol after this.  Reluctant to spend the rest of his life playing infanticidal Germans, Von Stroheim made up his mind to become a film director and went to great lengths to persuade Carl Laemmle, the top honcho at Universal Films, to allow him to direct a screenplay he had written entitled The Pinnacle.  Not a man to take kindly to being stalked by a sinister-looking Austrian, Laemmle acceded to von Stroheim's request, provided the film was made on a shoestring budget of around four thousand dollars.  Von Stroheim started where he intended to carry on and delivered a film that cost almost ten times that amount.  It was pretty well the only film he made on which he was given a free hand, although Universal did insist on a change of title, so The Pinnacle became Blind Husbands.

Even in this first, somewhat imperfect film, Von Stroheim's remarkable flair for visual drama is apparent, something he doubtless acquired whilst working as an assistant to the great D.W. Griffith (the author of such monumental pieces of cinema as The Birth of a Nation (1915) Intolerance (1916)).  Close-ups are used with consummate skill to expose the drama beneath the surface - the lustful intentions of a womanising officer (played, naturally, by Von Stroheim); the torment of the wife torn between adultery and loyalty to her husband; and the murderous intent of the cheated husband.  There is a chilling dream sequence in which the camera zooms in on Von Stroheim's scarred face from a distance, so that the Austrian looks scarily like something out of a German expressionist horror film.  And then there is the great set-piece at the end, the ascent of a mountain peak and the long anticipated showdown.  Some skilful editing renders these last scenes, magnificently played by Von Stroheim and his co-star Sam De Grasse, unbearably tense and suspenseful.  In this, and many other respects, Blind Husbands was a film that was years ahead of its time.

What is most interesting about the film is that Von Stroheim compels us to sympathise with what ought to be the least sympathetic character in the amorous triangle.  A title card at the start of the film prompts us to consider that it is the husband who neglects his wife who is most deserving of our contempt, not the 'other man' or the adulteress.  Von Stroheim's character is certainly the most imposing of the three, and the one who is the most convincingly drawn.  Far from being your conventional Hollywood cad, Lieutenant von Steuben is revealed to be a flawed, pathetic specimen of humanity who conceals his true nature behind a screen of lies and a borrowed air of superiority.  Taken out of his comfort zone, he appears as helpless as a newborn baby.  This is Von Stroheim's attempt to portray Don Juan as a tragic hero, and he almost gets away with it.  Already we can see echoes of those magnificant character roles that Von Stroheim would take on later in his career, when his directing aspirations had been totally extiguished.

In spite of its morally ambiguous, indeed openly subversive perspective on male-female relationships Blind Husbands proved to be a very successful film, and Von Stroheim followed this up with another, similarly themed hit, The Devil's Passkey, a film that is now sadly lost.  With Von Stroheim shaping up to be one of his studio's biggest money spinners, Carl Laemmle put him in charge of Universal's most expensive production so far, Foolish Wives (1922).  The film which went massively out of control and came close to bankrupting Universal was to be von Stroheim's ticket to posterity - but that, as they say, is another story.

Film Synopsis

An American doctor, Robert Armstrong, and his wife Margaret arrive at the Alpine village of Cortina d'Ampezzo in Northern Italy, looking forward to a well-deserved holiday.  Dr Armstrong ends up neglecting his wife, who turns out to be easy prey for a womanising Austrian cavalryman, Lieutenant Erich von Steuben.  Margaret is certainly attracted to the dashing officer, but is she ready to begin an affair which may lead her to leave her husband?  Oblivious to von Steuben's romantic manoeuvrings, Dr Armstrong agrees to accompany him on a climb of one of the most fearsome mountains in the Dolomites.  When they reach the summit it becomes clear that, for all his boasting, von Steuben is no mountaineer.  As the Austrian officer regains his breath, Armstrong inadvertently lays his hand on a letter in his pocket.  It is a letter from his wife.  Before he can read it, the officer grasps the missive and throws it away.  Armstrong immediately suspects the worst and threatens to send his rival to his death unless he truthfully answers one question: did his wife agree to leave with him?  Von Steuben answers in the affirmative...