Anna Karenina

Surprisingly, this mixture of MGM gloss, the aloof Garbo, and the labyrinthine Tolstoy works like a charm: visually and emotionally the most rarefied of Garbo's '30s films, with William Daniels' radiant photography preventing decorative blossoms, vines, banquet tables and riding-habits from congealing into the usual dull display of studio extravagance, and the dappled sunlight providing an ingenious background for Garbo's finely tortured passions. Rathbone, as usual, is enjoyably villainous as the husband; a drastically barbered March is less at ease as the lover; but the only real blot is provided by Freddie Bartholomew as the heroine's darling child, looking and sounding the way sickly chocolate tastes.