Mia Verhag loses her job as a chorus singer when she rejects the advances of the theatre director. While she is in the grips of despair, she encounters the millionaire Roswolsky, who takes her to his luxurious house and gives her a key to the garden gate, allowing her to visit the surrounding park whenever she pleases. This chance meeting sends rumours flying everywhere, and soon Mia appears on the front pages of all the newspapers as Roswolsky’s mistress. The city’s merchants and creditors compete to lend her money, and she lands the leading role in the theatre’s new production. There, she falls in love with Count Albich – but, believing the rumours, he avoids her. Mia follows him to Monte Carlo, while Roswolsky himself falls genuinely in love with her and plots to take Albich out of the running. A grand drama is set to unfold.
17 Jun Roswolsky’s Mistress (1921)
Industrial Revolution
I came to this as a warmup for what trusted folks say will be an important viewing in her ‘Hamlet’ made this same year.
This is a woman who invented women in film, so popular she went by ‘The Asta’. She was so powerful that she owned her own studio and controlled the art, making films as she wanted.
She’s credited with both introducing ‘natural’ acting to film, and defining a path for women’s roles that are either sultry or use that force for dramatic effect. Garbo credits her influence. She was Europe’s most popular celebrity during this period, our first film star.
Most of her films are lost.
I have to say that her charm was not effective for me, but I do note how she used her eyes. The actual filmmaking is unremarkable other than the obvious investment in sets and crowds. In fact, none of the effective tradecraft in editing seems to have been of interest. Scenes just appear and are gone with none of the sense we look for today. But we do get a clear enough through-story. And that’s interesting enough.
The Asta plays a minor chorus girl of no particular quality or guile. She’s fired and through uninteresting circumstances is mistaken in the press — seemingly obsessed with aristocratic gossip — for a rich industrialist’s mistress.
While we follow our girl in a developing sequence, the story is really about this guy, Roswolsky. First the girl…
As with the actress’ life, she is a minor chorus girl who supports her sister. She gets fired and is mistaken for the rich guy’s mistress. As he never denies it, she is free to cavort basically on his account. This brings her to a married ‘explorer’ with whom she is smitten. He seems interested but not overly so.
She is arrested for the debts she’s rung up. Roswolsky steps up to settle with the police, fund the explorer and see them off to Africa. While the camera is on her 90% of the time, what impresses is Roswolsky.
Now, this is between the wars when Germany was a mess and successful heavy manufacturing was rare and concentrated in the hands of fellows like this. He seems absolutely committed to his role in society, making jobs, building ships (explicitly mentioned) and other goods. He’s in a lavish estate but eschews luxury — in fact his offhand offering his garden to the suicidal chorus girl is what kicks off the fantasy.
He hears from others that the press is on about his love life, and he doesn’t care enough to even remark, while basically running the economy. We see lenders, bankers, and politicians who are secondary factors, even dependents. To my eye, there’s no evoking of Jewish stereotypes from the era.
When he hears that his indifference has allowed her to get into trouble, he takes the most unlikely path and subsidises her future with another man.
What’s remarkable is one scene before this where she visits him at home to return the key to the garden. He is so incompetent at relationships that he tries to rape her, which could motivate his later response. If there’s a connective scene on this it is lost.
Posted in 2025
Ted’s Evaluation — 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.
No Comments