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starring: John Barrymore, Lionel Barrymore, Wallace Beery, Frank Conroy, Joan Crawford
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9780790744667
Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, Original recording reissued, NTSC
ISBN: 079074466X
Label: Warner Home Video
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Release Date: March 07, 2000
Running Time: 113 minutes
Sales Rank: 17551
Studio: Warner Home Video
Theatrical Release Date: 1932
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Editorial Review:
Amazon.com essential video:
This Academy Award winner for Best Picture is a sweeping soap opera about the guests at the Grand Hotel. Several plots intertwine, but mostly it's about Stars! Stars! Stars! Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Wallace Beery, and both Barrymore brothers head up the cast. Garbo is luminous as Grusinskaya, the neurotic and famous-but-slipping dancer and, yes, she 'vonts to be alone.' John Barrymore is a cat burglar with blue blood and a heart of gold, and Lionel Barrymore happily caroms off him as Mr. Kringelein, a dying man who wants to live out the time he has left with the rich. Joan Crawford is perhaps the biggest surprise of the movie: as Flaemmchen, a young career girl trying to decide between secretary and tart, she is uncharacteristically funny, vivacious, and downright bubbly. Along the way we discover that money, fame, and titles don't guarantee happiness, and being a jewel thief doesn't necessarily make you a bad person. The nicest touch is the hint that other, minor plots swirl around the edges of the film, suggesting that we've only seen a small chapter of the hotel's story. Grand Hotel is a great deal of fun and an excellent chance to see some famous faces in their prime. --Ali Davis
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - Money, Money, Money
Lewis Stone with his twisted and burned up face, that looks bright red when he shows his right profile, steals the show if you're looking for the freakish side to pre-Code films. They would not have allowed him to wear that makeup had the film been made a year later. It's still pretty startling and symbolizes, I suppose, Janus, the face that looks backward and forward at the same time: a suitable pendant for the mise en scene of the GRAND HOTEL, where nothing changes, everything is always the same, ... Read More
Rating: - All Star MGM Extravaganza
Yep, "Grand Hotel", MGMs star-studded extravaganza.
Joan Crawford, Greta Garbo, Lionel & John Barrymore, Wallace Beery and
more.
The art deco sets are incredible.
I never understood the attraction 30's audiences had with Greta "I
vant to be alone" Garbo.
She's not much of a "looker" and her acting is, at best, mediocre.
Her character, as written, is laughably pathetic. Poor widdle Greta,
she vants to be alone. Maybe she should go to the theatre ... Read More
Rating: - Crawford Takes Her Place at the Grand Hotel
"Don't you understand? Don't you?" -- Barrymore telling Garbo he loves her.
Vicki Baum's popular novel was given the MGM treatment for the first time in "Grand Hotel." Though it does not hold up as well as its remake, "Weekend at the Waldorf," due to the lack of symmetry between a director and one of the stars, the overall impact is not muted in the least. It remains an entertaining time capsule to the early days of sound pictures, when MGM was just starting to roar.
The ... Read More
Rating: - Radiant glamour and dazzling exuberance !
Grand Hotel is a classic whose genuine glamour, artistic refinement and admirable good taste are still motive of discussion and admiration all over the world.
The agile camerawork, the perfect illumination, superb edition, level performances and rhythm are easily carved in relief since the first shot.
Greta Garbo in her role of the Russian dancer would seem to have anticipated her own signature for the posterity with that emblematic statement "I want to be alone" . On the other ... Read More
Rating: - Dazzling!
It's hard to believe that a film made in the early days of talking pictures could be so totally enjoyable for today's audience! The secret, besides a clever script, dazzling sets and costumes, of course is the cast! Wow! Some people complain that the acting is too mannered, especially in the cases of John Barrymore and Greta Garbo but I heartily disagree. Garbo plays a grand diva of the old school--she thinks big, acts big, lives big. Mumbling of the type of modern acting brought on by The Actors' Studio ... Read More
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