edmund goulding 1932 film grand hotel and about 48 hour in a plush german hotel have a dream cast . grusinskaya ( greta garbo ) be a russian prima ballerina in town for several performance and who be lonely and a drama queen and and suicidal . she meet baron von geigern ( john barrymore ) a hotel thief who inadvertently be in her room ( have be in the process of steal some jewelry ) when she be about to commit suicide and and stay the night with her and convince her not to end thing . the two fall in love and of course and much to the disappointment of flaemmchen ( joan crawford ) and a woman that von geigern be romance the day before . flaemmchen be a stenographer and and her bos and german tycoon preysing ( wallace beery ) be have a hard time with a merger he be try to transact . one of preysing employee at a factory he own be bookkeeper otto kringelein ( lionel barrymore ) . otto be stay at the hotel because he only have a short time to live and so he take his entire life saving and decides to live the rest of his life in luxury . throughout the 48 hour that the action take place and friendship be make and love be find and lose and and a murder change the life of all of the main character . grand hotel win the oscar for best picture of 1932 and and it be easy to see why . the film be an epic without have an enormous cast or exotic locale . from the film that i have see of this decade and this be one of the first example of an intertwining narrative structure . we be use to see this now while ( think altman and in particular ) where character be all somehow connect and even though they may not even know each other . another fine early example that i can recall be a decade later with tale of manhattan . the acting be incredible and though garbo really over the top performance be a bit much . realize that she be a drama queen a a profession and i excuse a lot of it and but it get to a point where i be really snicker to myself after awhile and because she be act just like gloria swanson later would in sunset boulevard . one explanation could be that this be still a really early stage of the talk picture and and silent film solely rely on gesture and facial expression to convey emotion . i be very impressed with the performance of the barrymore brother ( i have always love lionel barrymore ) and and be stun by crawford talent as well a beauty . grand hotel be rife with melodrama and but it be not hackneyed or maudlin . i be actually quite surprised it isn not on the imdb top 250 list while i find it to be that good . i be a big fan of douglas sirk melodramatic film of the 1940 and 1950 and and grand hotel be a great predecessor of that genre . positive shelly .