THE MARRIAGE CIRCLE

Live musical accompaniment by Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

Showings

Castro Theatre Sat, Dec 7, 2019 5:00 PM
Castro Theatre Tue, Feb 4, 2020 4:00 PM
Castro Theatre Wed, Feb 5, 2020 4:00 PM
Film Info
Director:Ernst Lubitsch
Cast:Florence Vidor
Monte Blue
Marie Prevost
Creighton Hale
Adolphe Menjou
Year:1924
Country:USA
Total Run Time:85 min.
Format:35mm

Description

Ernst Lubitsch’s adaptation of the play Only a Dream was his second American film and would set the tone for all his sparkling comedies to follow. The titular “circle” alludes to the ring of infidelities that animate the plot—and while the story is exquisitely plotted with headlong narrative twists and sophisticated intelligence, it’s the intricacies of human behavior that concern Lubitsch. An expert at adapting dialogue-ridden theater to silent films with few intertitles, Lubitsch works narrative magic with knowing looks and subtle gestures—his characters are brimming with humanity ... and hilarity. Set in Vienna, “the city of laughter and light romance,” The Marriage Circle centers on two couples—the sublimely-in-love Monte Blue and Florence Vidor, and the less-so Adolphe Menjou and Marie Prevost. The New Yorker’s Richard Brody writes, “Ernst Lubitsch turned a drawing-room farce into bittersweet chamber music.”

Live musical accompaniment by Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

Print (35mm) courtesy of MoMA. Preserved by The Museum of Modern Art with support from The Film Foundation

 

Introduction by Joseph McBride

 

Copresented by Art Deco Society of California