Greta Garbo's second American film, like her first, The Torrent (see December 5), was based on a steamy and improbable story by Blasco-Ibañez, and again paired her with a sexy Latin lover (Antonio Moreno). Set to exotic decor and costumes, the plot effectively metes out retribution toward the exquisite beauty who “makes all men her slaves,” charting her fall from the graces of a wealthy Argentine lover to the gutters of Paris. As in most of her later pictures, Garbo gives a performance that utterly transcends the clichéd script, and drew contemporary critics' praise for the economy and “inwardness” of her acting. The prominent Swedish director Mauritz Stiller, Garbo's friend and mentor, was assigned The Temptress but was replaced by Fred Niblo when his artistic laborings and improvisational techniques proved incomprehensible to MGM executives.