Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

As I have stated before and often in my reviews, I don't care whether or not a film adaptation is faithful to its source material; my only requirement is that it be good and stand on its own two feet. Love (1927) mostly does this; I haven't read Anna Karenina, though I am familiar with the basic outline of the plot. Love hits the high points of the story, though it does make the relationship between Anna and Vronsky more a case of two soul mates finding one another than what those two characters are in the novel.Garbo is luminescent as Anna. She was not only gorgeous, but she could communicate such depth and soul despite being featured in so many standard melodramas. Gilbert does good and is ardent as the romantic lead, but Garbo steals the show. As is usual with most 1920s MGM melodramas, the production is lavish and pretty. My biggest issue is that the story is incredibly rushed; everything moves so quickly and it feels like scenes were even lost or snipped. Nothing develops gradually. Aside from that problem, Love is a nice romantic drama, though if you want your Garbo-Gilbert fix, you're better off with Flesh and the Devil or A Woman of Affairs.

I just wanted to say that I really appreciated your review of "Love". I had no idea that Greta Garbo made two versions of Anna Karenina and it sounds like the first might be even better than the second. I haven't seen it yet but now I will surely keep an eye open for it on TCM. I liked how you touched on the fact that silent movies really emphasize actual acting and not just people talking. The fact that Garbo and Gilbert were in love in real life must make the film only that more passionate. I really just wanted to review your review. I don't know if that is the purpose of the form I am filling out. It is obvious that you are a real lover of films and it is always nice to know there is another one out there. You did a great and thorough job explaining why you enjoyed "Love".

LOVE is the perfect title for this hacked-down adaptation of Tolstoy's mammoth novel ANNA KARENINA. It was made to cash in on the popularity of Greta Garbo and John Gilbert, fresh from their box office triumph in FLESH AND THE DEVIL earlier the same year. Like virtually all of Garbo's silent films, much of the screen time is devoted to watching the great tormented Swede abandon herself to love, suffer for love, contemplate love, lose love, die. It is interesting to compare this version of the novel with the one made eight years later in which Garbo played opposite Fredric March who, while less dashing and handsome than Gilbert, did give a fine performance as the impetuous and essentially cruel Count Vronsky. In the latter film Garbo is less attractive due to the clash between the curly coiffure she is given and the strong planes and features of her face. She even looks like a male in drag in some scenes. But in LOVE she is beautiful and feminine throughout. The clinging 1920's-style dresses help, even if they detract from the authenticity of a story that is supposed to be set in 1870's Russia. Gilbert was one of the best actors of his era and the talent shows here. He is also a magnetic screen presence and one can understand why audiences in 1927 flocked to see these two together. The scenes of mother-son tenderness between Garbo and Philippe deLacy do indeed seem incestuous as others have pointed out, but so do the scenes between Garbo and Freddie Bartholomew in the 1935 version. I think it was just Garbo's way of expressing love on screen; you see her perform the same kind of nuzzling in other movies, whether the attentions are being given to a man, a woman or a child. I disliked both endings, but at least Garbo was ravishing in the happy one. And remember, Garbo was just shy of 22 when she filmed this, yet she is believable as an older woman. She had a face that could express any age. This movie cries out for a re-scoring. The print shown on TCM is marred by what sounds like muffled applause from time to time.

Love is a better than you expect silent film romance.There are a few remarkable qualities a film lover will encounter in Love. Foremost is how little the emotional impact of Love has faded over the years (relative to other silent films). Often silent films are enjoyable because they have aged and we can delight in their quaint or old-fashioned sensibility, laughing while comparing how much movies and pop culture have changed. Love, however, has largely maintained its original affect, which is particularly amazing given it is a sentimental tear-jerker romance, a genre that ages, perhaps, lest well. These eighty years later we still can related to the feelings of both Captain Count Alexei Vronsky (John Gilbert) and Anna Karenina (Greta Garbo) while we root for their love. Of course there are plenty of moments, originally dramatic, that are now laughable, but over all the film has age well. (Most odd is the depiction of Anna and her son's love. Today it plays with disturbingly incestuous overtones. I do not know how it played in 1927.)The second striking feature, also related to how well this film has aged, is how beautiful Greta Garbo appears. Like many elements in silent films, standards are beauty may not translate across generations. Actors and actresses considered amazingly beautiful in the teens and twenties may no longer satisfy the modern movie star equivalent. Garbo, however, is still strikingly, obviously beautiful. The final striking feature is a bit of trivia – there are two endings to Love, an American ending and a European. The difference in endings is striking in that the same divergent choices would probably be made today. The European ending is bleak, tragic and emotionally effective, as Anna steps in front of the rushing train rather than live without her lover and son. Further, it is the ending in the original text, Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. The American ending is predictable, saccharine and laughable. Americans in 1927, like American today, want their romances to end with all the loose ends tided up, all the obstacles overcome, and all our couples marring to live happily ever after.Story Synopsis: Love is based on Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. Anna Karenina meets Captain Count Alexei Vronsky in a terrible blizzard late one afternoon and he helps her to shelter. He is instantly smitten, but she rejects him. Vronsky helps Anna back to the Czarist court and her husband, Senator Alexei Karenina. Vronsky too is part of the court, the top assistant to the Grand Duke. Vronsky and Anna continue to meet at various events: official functions, dances, wolf hunts. Eventually they fall hopelessly in love. The court is abuzz as it is obvious to all who see Vronsky and Anna that they are attracted to each other. Karenina cold and authoritarian, warns Anna of court gossip and commands she at least be inconspicuous and avoid public scandal. Anna and Vronsky try a number of times to stop seeing each but their love is overpowering. Eventually they abscond to Italy, rejecting their former lives to live as lovers. Anna, however, cannot bare being away from her son. When she returns Karenina refuses to allow Anna to visit her son again. Further, Anna finds out that Vronsky is going to be dismissed from his military post because of their affair. Realizing how awful that would be for Vronsky she makes a deal with his commander: if she leaves St. Petersburg forever Vronsky will retain his post. She decides to leave on the next train, sacrificing her happiness for Vronsky's. But Anna cannot bear the thought of leaving both her lover and her adored son. Instead of riding her train into exile she steps in front of it to her death. The ending is sudden, shocking, and effective. A surprisingly poignant ending to a film of pleasant surprises. American Ending: Years later Vronsky happens upon Anna and her son. Vronsky has maintained his high military post, Anna's husband is dead, mother and son are together, Anna and Vronsky still love each and will surely soon marry now that they have re-found each other. And we have "happily ever after'.