Silent movies - Flesh and the Devil

This is not the first time I present a movie based on a book by German dramatist Hermann Sudermann (see here), but this is the first time I have one for you starring Greta Garbo and John Gilbert. Interested?
Prepare for "Flesh and the Devil" from 1926.

Here's the plot (with spoilers!).

Ulrich von Eltz, his sister Hertha, and Leo von Harden have been friends since childhood.
Ulrich and Leo are soldiers in a hussar regiment together.
 

When they are on home leave and get off the train to meet Hertha (who's desperately in love with Leo) and Leo's mother, Leo falls in love with a woman also getting off the train.

He meets her again at the first ball of the season and they begin a passionate affair.
Unfortunately, Felicitas "forgets" to tell Leo that she's married, and her husband surprises them and challenges Leo to a duel, but to avoid a scandal, a dispute at cards is given as the official reason.
Leo shoots Count von Rhaden and is advised by the military court to enlist in the African service for five years.
He asks Ulrich to look after Felicitas while he's gone. Ulrich visits Felicitas, and not knowing about her affair with Leo, he falls for her immediately. When he offers her his advice, she's not interested, but when she hears that he's rich and that "his purse is Leo's", he has her attention.

Leo is allowed to return after three years. Of course, he hurries home, but is shocked to be welcomed at the station by Ulrich and his wife - Felicitas.
He's determined to avoid them both from now on, but he can't stay away when Felicitas tells him how much Ulrich suffers from his friend's absence.

Felicitas keeps trying to seduce Leo, and despite the pastor delivering a fiery sermon aimed at them, they finally can't resist and decide to go away together that night.

Felicitas has packed and is waiting for Leo, but Ulrich comes back from a trip earlier than expected. He brings his wife an expensive diamond bracelet as a gift, and when Leo arrives to take her away, she lets him know that she isn't brave enough to leave and asks why they can't just stay and go on like this?

Leo is disgusted by the idea and tries to choke her when Ulrich storms in (we got a choking scene in the other Sudermann based movie as well, by the way). Felicitas claims that Leo wanted to force her to go away with him and choked her after she refused. Outraged, Ulrich challenges Leo to a duel in the morning.
The next morning - the men are already on their way to the Isle of Friendship where they became blood brothers as children - Hertha makes her way to Felicitas's room and implores her to prevent the duel.

Ulrich warns Leo that he will shoot to kill, but Leo just lifts the gun not pointing at Ulrich which makes his friend suddenly realize that Leo has loved Felicitas even before he did. They know that their friendship is more important than falling out over a woman.

Meanwhile, Felicitas has given in to Hertha's pleas. On her way to the island, however, she hits some thin ice and drowns without anyone hearing her cries for help.

Wow.
To be honest, I had expected some eye rolling as this kind of plot is usually too dramatic for me, and you may think the same from seeing the pictures.
That's not surprising as Sudermann's novel that the movie it's based on is from 1894, and having some experience with old "Engelhörnchen" or adventure novels that delve into military or student or Western bromances, I had been prepared. There's a lot of hugging.
 

My best friend and I never had the guts to become
"blood sisters", maybe a sculpture like that
would have helped us with that ... 😉

It's rather weird, but part of me feels the urge to make fun of the movie for its drama, its overacting in some scenes (I really thought Garbo overdid it in the scene with Hertha), the heroic bromance, and also for some of the comic relief moments, for example with the tippling pastor.

Another part isn't happy about the misogyny typical for that time.
Felicitas is the villain of the movie and there is no doubt she is the big manipulator, but it seems that she gets the whole blame because she's a woman, and I thought that wasn't quite fair.
At one point, the pastor says to Leo: "My boy, when the devil cannot reach us through the spirit ... he creates a woman beautiful enough to reach us through the flesh." (hence the title, in German the book and film are just called "Es war" (It was)).
Which of course gives Leo immediate absolution from giving in to temptation even after Felicitas is married a second time. To his best friend. Whom he hasn't told about the real reason for the first duel. His best friend, his blood brother. I wonder why he didn't tell him? Was he ashamed? Not ashamed enough, though, not to repeat the mistake? Because Eva, sorry, Felicitas was "beautiful enough" (which is an insult to women in itself in my opinion).

There were a few scenes to make us see how evil Felicitas was (so much that she had to die at the end).
We don't get to see the first duel completely, we only know Count von Rhaden died when his widow tries on black hats with a smirk on her face.
When the pastor delivers his accusatory sermon, she just looks at him and slowly refreshes her lipstick. In church!
When they receive their communion, the pastor turns the cup with the wine a little for each person, but she deliberately turns it back to press her lips to the same spot as Leo.

You may expect from me now to say that I didn't like the movie, but you would be wrong. I noticed all of these things, and yes, there was a bit of eye rolling here and there, but overall I really enjoyed the movie and Garbo is the main reason for that.
It's not difficult to see how this movie became her breakthrough.
She plays the femme fatale wonderfully and her scenes with Gilbert - which are quite steamy - profited from their budding relationship starting while shooting the film (which was of course very interesting to the audience).
Garbo kept working with the director Clarence Brown and the cinematograph William H. Daniels, if you watch the movie, you'll understand why. The light, the mood, it was the perfect stage for her - and for the whole story.

Countdown of the first duel

I watched the movie with a score by Carl Davis (you may know his work from "Pride and Prejudice" with Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth) who wrote a lot of beautiful silent film music. It really enhanced the overall feeling.

Time for my final words - the movie absolutely gets a recommendation from me.

P.S. Oh hey, I almost forgot to mention the alternate ending that they didn't use. You see Ulrich and Leo sit with Leo's mother when Hertha comes out telling them that she's going to move to Munich now that she's 18. She gets in the carriage, but Leo runs after it. He makes her get out and they are standing there, lost in each others' eyes.
Glad they didn't use that!
P.P.S. Pet peeve alert ... it sure doesn't look as if they let a German handle the German phrases ...


Further reading:

1. "JEC": Flesh and the Devil (1926). On: A Cinema History, June 2018
2. Brandie Ashe: Feminist Fridays: Flesh and the Devil (1926). On: True Classics, September 10, 2010