In 1962, Vincente Minnelli remade the famous silent spectacle of 1921, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse starring Valentino in an iconic performance, highlighted by a legendary tango scene that audiences talked about for years..
Based on the Blasco Ibanez novel, this anti-war message saga of cousins who end up fighting on opposite sides during WWI is necessarily grim but powerful in imagery.
Madariaga, Argentinian cattle baron, has two daughters: one married a Frenchman, the other a German. Madariaga favors his French grandson Julio as his heir, but Julio is a wastrel and a rake whose dubious achievement is excellence in tangoing.
When Madariaga dies, his fortune is split between his daughters. The German side of the family goes back to Berlin, while the French half moves to Paris, where Julio becomes a painter and falls in love with Marguerite, a married woman.
When WWI explodes (described by the mystic Tchernoff as the coming Apocalypse), and Marguerite’s husband is blinded, Julio joins the army, and becomes a reformed character. But it also means that Julio must face his own cousin on the battlefield.
Cast
Pomeroy Cannon…. Madariaga, the Centaur
Josef Swickard…. Marcelo Desnoyers
Bridgetta Clark…. Dona Luisa
Rudolph Valentino…. Julio Desnoyers
Virginia Warwick…. Chichi
Alan Hale…. Karl von Hartrott
Mabel Van Buren…. Elena
Stuart Holmes…. Captain von Hartrott
John St. Polis…. Etienne Laurier
Alice Terry…. Marguerite Lurier
Mark Fenton…. Senator Lacour
Derek Ghent…. Rene Lacour
Nigel De Brulier…. Tchernoff
Bowditch M. Turner…. Argensola
Edward Connelly…. Lodgekeeper
Credits
Running time: 114 minutes (also 150 minutes)
Black and White
Silent
Directed by Rex Ingram
Writing: Vicente Blasco Ibáñez, June Mathis
