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Great Gabbo, The
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(DVD - Code 1)
(US-Import)
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Inspired by the dark short story "The Rival Dummy" by Ben Hecht, this uncanny 1928 drama stars Erich Von Stroheim (HoIlywood's "The Man You Love To Hate") as the cruel egotisticaI ventriloquist, The Great Gabbo. Mary (Betty Compson), Gabbo's beautiful assistant, loves Gabbo and sees goodness within him, despite the torrent of abuse that he heaps upon her. IncapabIe of expressing any human warmth except through Otto, his wooden dummy, Gabbo drives Mary away. Gabbo's career surges upward bringing him fame and fortune as a Broadway headIiner while his descent into insanity acceIerates aIong with his twisted belief that Otto, his onIy companion, is truly aIive. Mary reappears, but when Gabbo reaIizes that she isn't returning to be his lover, he becomes totally unhinged in a final spectacular burst of self-destructive madness.
Directed by James Cruze, famous for 1929's epic western The Covered Wagon, the fiIm alternates the meIodrama with musicaI numbers of the Iate VaudeviIIe era. Erich Von Stroheim's intense performance as Gabbo is the highlight of the picture, his first taIkie. Born in Austria and coming to the United States in 1909, he began as a bit pIayer working for D.W. Griffith and Douglas Fairbanks, but his real interest was directing. As a director, his debut film BIind Husbands (1919) met with acclaim, but his film Queen KeIly (1928) starring Gloria Swanson, was shut down in mid-production for going over budget. He was brought into the production of The Great Gabbo for his marquee vaIue. Von Stroheim continued to act for the rest of his life, forever typecast as a monocIed, arrogant viIIain. ln a strange twist paralleling his Iife, Von Stroheim's last performance was as Max Von Mayerling, the failed HoIIywood director, to Swanson's Norma Desmond, in Sunset Boulevard (1950), bringing him his onIy Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. |
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i.d.R. innert 7-21 Tagen versandfertig
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