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FOOLISH WIVES

1921

Erich von Stroheim

Foolish Wives

SYNOPSIS

In Monte Carlo, a fraudulent aristocrat targets the wife of an American diplomat, weaving seduction, debt, and social disguise into a scheme of calculated exploitation. Around him, desire and vanity expose a world where status is performance and morality is easily bartered.

CRITIQUE

Erich von Stroheim’s film is a monumental study of decadence, remarkable for its obsessive realism and corrosive view of privilege. Its lavish design and moral severity turn melodrama into social anatomy. Even in altered form, it remains a key silent work, both excessive and exacting in its vision of corruption.

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