Don't Change Your Husband

Although this DVD is actually a double feature of silent films directed by Cecil B. DeMille, 1919's Don't Change Your Husband receives top—indeed, practically sole—billing by virtue of the fact that it's the first of six DeMille movies to star Gloria Swanson. Though only in her early 20s, Swanson is here cast as a sophisticated society wife who tires of her dullard husband and divorces him in order to wed a slick playboy. However, when she discovers that her new hubby is two-timing her, she not only dumps him but maneuvers her ex into remarrying her. The second film is 1915's The Golden Chance, which stars the more obscure Cleo Ridgely as a pretty but poor housewife who's hired by a society couple to accompany a handsome millionaire to a party. When the rich gentleman falls for her, Ridgely's bum of a husband tries to blackmail him but only ends up hurting himself. Both pictures are fairly typical DeMille products, opulently made but rather stage-bound, offering a rather clumsy sort of titillation in the guise of moralizing. Still, the transfers on this extra-less disc are excellent, with appropriate tinting and decent musical accompaniment from the chamber group Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra. Recommended for larger collections. [Note: also newly available from Image is DeMille's Why Change Your Wife? starring Swanson (which also includes Miss Lulu Bett).] (F. Swietek)