Greta Garbo, Anna Christie

as ANNA CHRISTIE

Greta Garbo, Romance

as RITA CAVALLINI

Greta Garbo, Ninotchka

as NINOTCHKA

After years and years of suffering miserably yet fabulously in talkies, Greta Garbo decided to end the decade with a little bit of laughter. I’ve had an interesting viewing relationship with Garbo throughout the course of the 1930’s—more often than not I haven’t cared much for her performances, which I tend to find as being too distant and too focused on alluring our gaze through her beauty as opposed to her acting ability. And still, I’ve sat through her many performances regardless of my feelings about her, either because she was nominated (Anna Christie, Romance, Camille), because of a different category’s nomination (Conquest, Grand Hotel) or because of my personal inquiry (Queen Christina, Anna Karenina), each delivering the same model: “I am beautiful, I am also deeply in love with (insert name of actor here) but (insert circumstances here) is keeping us from being happy together. I am depressed because of said circumstances. Depending on the film, I may be depressed enough that I might just die.” So it’s rather interesting (and great) that she got her final nomination for a performance completely unlike any of her others. 

Greta Garbo, Camille

as MARGUERITE GAUTIER

Won: New York Film Critics Circle - Best Actress

The main reason why I haven't been all that fond of the Greta Garbo performances I've seen thus far is because of that Greta Garbo Illusion. There's always that sense of unapproachability--it defines Garbo's entire legacy. In everything I've seen her in, she seems so detached from the audience and she's kind of wafting in her own world. This in turn reinforced the novelty of the Garbo image, and no one was more aware of this than Garbo herself--she didn't like it when people lingered on set and stared at her during filming, and when director George Cukor asked why, she replied: "When people are watching, I'm just a woman making faces for the camera. It destroys the illusion." So therein lies my problem: the elusiveness that makes up much of Garbo's appeal has to be maintained, but it makes connecting with her and feeling for her a problem especially if the characters she plays--troubled and depressed women--require a viewer's compassion. I had my reservations about Camille, thinking it'd be another two hour picture where Garbo stands around "making faces" under the pretense of suffering. Upon watching Camille, I could tell immediately that there was something different about Garbo here.

Greta Garbo, Anna Karenina

as ANNA KARENINA

Won: New York Film Critics Circle - Best Actress

I have an issue with Greta Garbo, and I hope I'm not the only one who feels this way...But I don't get her. I want to like her, really I do, but after watching her in a handful of films, I've found myself consistently underwhelmed. It's gotten to a point where I sort of bemoan the thought of having to sit through another Garbo picture because they're all so homogenous and unexciting. Garbo won the very first Best Actress award from the New York Film Critics Circle in 1935 for her work in Anna Karenina, and it is noted in Inside Oscar that her eventual Oscar snub proved to be a big surprise that year, with people jokingly surmising that she was ignored because AMPAs knew she wouldn't show up to the ceremony anyways. So I sat through Anna Karenina, hoping that maybe this would be the time Garbo would finally prove me wrong.