Because of its length, I had to watch this film in three segments, and each segment presented a revelation. In the first segment, it was the famous tango by Rudolph Valentino, which might be considered great acting all by itself. In the second segment, it was the tragic romance between Rudolph Valentino and Alice Terry, so well played by both of them. In the final segment, it was Nigel De Brulier's reply to Josef Swickard's question: "Did you know my son?"-"I knew them all", and what a beautiful expression of sympathy was on his face! The movie was quite long, but it had a story to tell that needed a longer length! Everyone in it was quite good, especially Rudolph Valentino, Alice Terry, Nigel De Brulier, and Josef Swickard! The direction by Rex Ingram was excellent, also!

This expensive classic silent was the box office hit that started Rudolph Valentino's career as a starring actor. It is both an epic and a family saga.The movie starts in Argentina with a wealthy landowner, Madariaga the Centaur (Pomeroy Cannnon), and his two daughters; one is married to a German, Karl von Hartrott (Alan Hale) and has three sons. The other is married to a Frenchman, Marcelo Desnoyers (Josef Swickard) and is awaiting her first child. Not favoring von Hartrott or his family, Madariaga is happy to learn that his other daughter has a boy who he names Julio. As Julio (Rudolph Valentino) grows up, it is clear that the powerful grandfather prefers him over all his other grandchildren. He spoils him, teaching him no values or skills. When Madariaga dies, his estate is split equally between his two daughters. Hartrott decides to sell his half and take his family back to his fatherland, Germany. Desnoyers follows suit by taking his family to France. When the useless Julio moves to France, he studies art (probably to paint nude women) but is better known as a local Tango dancer. While out on the town, Julio meets a young married woman, Marguerite Lurier (Alice Terry). They fall in love and have a prolonged affair. Her husband, Etienne (John St. Polis), discovers it and demands satisfaction from Julio. Julio's father begs his old friend, Etienne, not to start a family scandal by dueling with his son. During this time, the Great War breaks out. As war engulfs Europe, all personal issues fade away as powerful symbols of war (the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse) take their place on the stage. Almost all the Frenchmen, including Etiene, enlist in the army. Since the Desnoyers family is not French, they remain behind as civilians. Eventually, however, they are also drawn into the war as Julio becomes a French soldier. Marguerite becomes a nurse and discovers her husband has become blind while in battle. She is then torn between her duty to her husband and her love for Julio. The war also inevitably causes the Desnoyers to clash with the Hartrotts, with cousin fighting against cousin. Eventually,the war recedes and shows us its aftermath. Although the message of the movie is strongly antiwar, it uses the techniques of romanticism—symbolic imagery and title cards laced with poetry—rather than the more gut-wrenching realism that we would later see in other World War I movies such as The Big Parade and Wings

1st watched 10/20/2013 - 4 out of 10(Dir-Rex Ingram): Heavy handed anti-war movie comes across very one-sided as far as the perspective on a war between Germany and France in this epic family drama, love story & war movie wrapped into one package. Rudolph Valentino plays a son of a Parisian who departed to Argentina fleeing the country from an earlier conflict, but returns after his grand-father's demise. The son has a weakness for the woman-folk and becomes involved with the wife of one of his German cousins causing scandal between the two families. He is an artist who lives off his father's money until he decides to join the cause of the war. The four horsemen come into play as an allegory against the biblical reference(referred to in the movie as an old book) in Revelations where each horsemen represents a different side of the results of war activity and the movie does some special effects introducing these horsemen at different points of the movie. Rudolph's father hordes antiques in an old castle in France, but it's destroyed by the German's in an almost naturally occurring guilty verdict on his original escape from the draft. This is a departure from the rest of the movie's otherwise emotionally pointed view about the negative perspective on war. There is not much detail given to the war only that Germany is the conqueror and France takes the blunt of their blows. I believe the piece would have been stronger if the motivations of both sides would have been revealed better. The romance in the story is lessened and seems to just be an opportunity to show off the good looking Valentino's occasional dancing with the ladies. I'm sure the actual re-percussions of World War I prompted the novel and the movie and this played real well to packed houses in America when it first came out, but doesn't play as well to the current age. Overall, I just didn't see that the movie made it's point very effective -- which appeared to be that war should be avoided. In my opinion it wasn't bold enough in it's assessment.

Valentino was in New York when he read in a trade paper that this movies was going to be made. He had already read the book and wanted to play the tango scenes. He had much experience with the Brazilian Tango when he made his living as a "Taxi Dancer" (A dancer that is picked up by a partner and paid for the time he dances with them - like a taxi) in New York. When he came back to Los Angeles to inquire about the tango scene in the movie, he learned that the casting office had been looking for him and already wanted him to play the part of Julio. He was so thrilled! Some people aren't aware that Valentino had come to Los Angeles in the first place because he wanted to work in agriculture. He was tired of taxi dancing and he also had been involved in a scandal in New York that ruined his reputation as a dancer. When he filled out an application to work at Metro studios, the question on the application asked "Why do you want to work in movies?" Valentino wrote the answer "Tired of ballroom dancing." Valentino loved to dance. Many times he kept a dancing job on the side before he was making big money. Then he still danced for fun.