Greed

N.p. N.p., Circa 1924. Vintage reference photograph from the 1924 silent film, showing actors Gibson Gowland and Zasu Pitts.

Based on Frank Norris' 1899 novel "McTeague." An impoverished miner-turned-dentist wins the lottery, but the ensuing fortune threatens to ruin the lives of everyone it touches. Director Erich von Stroheim's masterpiece, one of the first films to be shot entirely on location, in San Francisco and Death Valley, using (what were then considered) sophisticated and relatively new filming techniques, such as montage editing and deep focus.

Stroheim's first cut of the film was a mammoth, 9.5-hour presentation, edited down to two and a half hours against his wishes. All that survives today is a restored, slightly choppy but coherent 240-minute version, supplanted with still photographs, that conveys to the viewer the unimaginable grandeur of the original.

10 x 8 inches. Very Good plus overall, with brief wear to the bottom edge.

National Film Registry. Ebert I. Godard, Histoire(s) du cinema. Rosenbaum 1000.

[Book #151576]