Review of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

I know that this is a celebrated classic, but it sprawls. Some of the scenes -- Valentino dancing, for example -- are there only for their own sake, and add little to the narrative movement. Many of the long sequences with the greedy Frenchman are just tedious. Like the films of D.W. Griffith, this one is preachy and moralistic. The film finally makes a powerful point -- all the sons of the father who urged them to war,or, in the case of the Frenchman, was delighted to see his son in uniform, die in World War I. The battle sequences -- the epic 'trip to the underworld' -- are interesting for their mix of mud and allegory. Valentino makes the film worth while, and the wonderful Alice Terry, best of the silent screen actresses, makes the film memorable. Had the film tightened around the doomed relationship between Valentino and Terry it would have lost its sweep, but it would have achieved an intensity that the finished product lacks.