Written and directed by Von Stroheim for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Edited by June Mathis.
Photographed by Ben Reynolds, William Daniels and Ernest B. Schoedsack.
Based on the novel McTeague by Frank Norris.
The Cast: McTeague (GIBSON GOWLAND): Trina Sieppe (ZASU PITTS): Marcus Schooler (JEAN HERSHOLT): Zerkow (CESARE GRAVINA): Maria (DALE FULLER): Papa Sieppe (CHESTER CONKLIN): Mama Sieppe (SYLVIA ASHTON): Saddlemaster (HUGHIE MACK): McTeague's Mother (TEMPE PIGGOTT): Selina (JOAN STANDING): August (AUSTIN JEWELL): The Sieppe Twins (OSCAR & OTTO GOTELL)
Attempting to confine program notes on Greed to a single sheet of paper is, to say the least, an unrewarding task. So much has been written about this early classic, by Von Stroheim, writers, critics and historians all over the world, and all of it so intensely interesting, that one almost feels one is "cheating" if a single reference is deleted. However, we are fortunate in having Mr. Herman G. Weinberg to introduce the film for us. Recognised as the foremost authority on the films of Von Stroheim, Herman can undoubtedly describe the original thirty-reel version frame-by-frame, and thus can be relied upon to outline all the facts that we, through pressure of space, are forced to omit. To those of our members who would like as much advance data as possible prior to seeing the film, we recommend reference to Peter Noble's Hollywood Scapegoat, a biography of Von Stroheim which has many pages of invaluable information on Greed, and the published film notes of the Museum of Modern Art.
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For all of Von Stroheim's complaints of "butchering," the existing version of Greed is still a masterpiece, and certainly quite superior to any of his other works. Blind Husbands though an extremely interesting work, was basically a blueprint for what was to follow; The Devil's Passkey has not been seen for years, and thus a current evaluation is extremely difficult. Foolish Wives, The Wedding March and Queen Kelly were all cut or distorted in varying degrees, Merry-go-Round (shown by this society last year) was taken over and completed by another director, and Walking Down Broadway was withdrawn before release and completely remade. His one film to achieve release in some semblance of the state in which it was made - The Merry Widow - was perhaps his least interesting effort, and today certainly is quite a weak sister compared to the magnificence of Greed.
The deletion of twenty-two reels in no way dismayed the critics, who were unanimous in their praise of the film. Rudolph Messell remarked in 1928 that in its eleven-reel version it was so nearly a perfect film that he couldn't regard the deletions as a calamity. In 1932 Andrew Buchanan commented that ".... the genius of Von Stroheim for telling his story clearly and relentlessly, without once introducing an unnecessary incident, resulted in a production which gripped audiences ...," while Oswell Blakeston simply remarked Greed is the greatest of all modern films." Our own Herman G. Weinberg summed it up thus: "A choleric film, reviling the lust for money and presenting a more acid social reality than had ever been achieved before on the American screen, Greed swept through the U.S.A. with the brutality of a whirlwind, and later scored a remarkable artistic success in Europe."
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Quite incidentally, Norris' novel had been filmed once before - in 1915 as Life's Whirlpool, with Fania Marinoff and Holbrock Blinn. Insignificant and now forgotten, the film had little in common with Stroheim's work. He scorned the use of studio stages, took over whole blocks of streets for shooting, spent a fortune on location shooting in Death Valley, and made a point of including in his film every incident and character from the original book. He used tinting throughout for all gold objects - money, a canary, teeth, etc. - and incorporated into his original version many deliberately fantastic dream sequences. When he was finished, Von found himself with 42 reels of film. Hoping to have it released in two parts, he cut it down to twenty four. As a favor to Von, Rex Ingram, a close friend, cut it down to 18, and refused to shorten it further. Thalberg and Mayer stepped in however, and cut a further seven reels out of it, whereupon Von disowned it completely and the film went out into release to become the most catastrophic financial flop in movie history, despite the praises heaped on it from critical sources. (Von's comments on Metro's "button-hole men" and the cutter "on whose mind was nothing but a hat" make fascinating reading in Peter Noble's volume).
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