I like a lot of scenes in The Single Standard, but there’s only one I love.
It’s night, it’s raining. Arden Stuart (Great Garbo), in need of a walk, leaves her home anyway. As she joins hundreds of others carrying their umbrellas along a city street, a smiling man sidles up to her and begins to flirt.
“I’m walking alone because I want to walk alone,” she tells him.
He keeps in lockstep with her, still talking. He grabs the stem of her umbrella. And so she simply turns and crosses the street, still in the downpour, leaving him holding it. That is all you need to know about Arden Stuart.
