Remembering Luise Rainer: A look at 'The Good Earth'

Luise Rainer was was not just another European import to Hollywood. She wasn’t just a pretty face. She was an artist at a time when Hollywood run more like a machine. Unfortunately, it was a machine that spit her out, but she’s had the last laugh. The biggest Hollywood stars get to pick and chose the roles they want, something Rainer fought to do, but was denied at a time when they were told what to do.

Even after becoming the first person to ever win back-to-back acting Oscars, Rainer was limited in what she could do. She eventually left Hollywood, but those performances that she won those awards for remain two of the most powerful to earn Best Actress titles.

Her first came for The Great Ziegfeld, the 1936 Best Picture winner. While she had more of a supporting part as Florenz Ziegfeld’s first wife, Anna Held, she became probably the first actress to win an award on the strength of just one scene. In the second half of the film, she makes a tearful call to Ziegfeld (William Powell) to congratulate him on his marriage to Billie Burke (Myrna Loy). While Rainer is excellent in the rest of the film - and even has to sing - this moment cemented her stardom. After she hands up the phone, she buries her face in a sofa. We can truly feel that Anna Held loved Ziggy and the overwhelming sadness of the scene.

In 1937, Rainer followed up Ziegfeld with The Good Earth, based on the Pulitzer Prize novel by Pearl S. Buck. Even though the film is set in China, every member of the main cast is played by a white star. Paul Muni plays Wang Lung, a farmer who is put in an arranged marriage to O-Lan (Rainer), a slave from a powerful house. At first, their relationship is cold, but they begin to fall in love.

Buck’s background for the relatively simple story is the political upheaval in China. While their world crumbles, Wang Lung’s fortunes rise and fall and his uncle (Walter Connolly) tries to exploit him. But O-Lan is behind him, even when he’s a total jerk to her.

This is a film where effects, like the locusts storm or the mob’s destruction of a mansion, could take attention away from the acting. However, director Sidney Franklin ensures that Rainer isn’t lost in the shuffle. His close-ups, shot by Oscar-winner Karl Freund (Metropolis, Dracula), show her fragility and yet giver her the stage to be the emotional center of the film.

I’ll admit, I had been apprehensive for years about seeing The Good Earth because of the make-up and the all-white cast, but once the film starts, you can focus on the story. It’s a glorious, sweeping story in the Grand Old Hollywood tradition and Rainer’s performance is extraordinary.

Rainer died today at the age of 104. It seemed like she would be around forever. There was some kind of comfort you felt while watching these two Oscar-winning performances and knowing that she was still with us. While I watch The Good Earth again, she will be alive again, at least on the screen. It's been 77 years since The Good Earth came out and Rainer is still bringing us to tears.