Master Of The House/Dvd, Criterion Collection, DVD

Before he got up close and personal with Joan of Arc, the Danish cinema genius Carl Theodor Dreyer (VAMPYR) fashioned this finely detailed, ahead-of-it's-time examination of domestic life. In this heartfelt story of a housewife who, with the help of a wily nanny, turns the tables on her tyrannical husband, Dreyer finds lightness and humor; it's a deft comedy of revenge that was an enormous box-office success and is considered an early example of feminism on-screen. Constructed with the director's customary meticulousness and stirring sense of justice, MASTER OF THE HOUSE is a jewel of silent cinema.