Film

In this pitch-black combination of film noir and showbiz tragedy, Gloria Swanson takes on the now-iconic role of Norma Desmond, a silent-screen diva whose descent into obscurity after the advent of sound eerily mirrors Swanson’s own Hollywood career. In her cavernous mansion on Sunset Boulevard, Norma keeps by her side a hack screenwriter boy toy (Holden), a devoted butler (Von Stroheim), and old has-been friends (including Buster Keaton) by her side, all living off her wealth and feeding her larger-than-life ego.  Billy Wilder’s masterpiece is a bitter appraisal of an aging star’s delusions—and one of cinema’s most merciless dissections of the ravages of celebrity.