Word: empresses
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Tremont--"Rasputin and the Empress." The acting of the Barrymoros makes this worth seeing. Noithor this nor "Cavalcado" are at popular prices...
Fierce old Tzu Hsi, crafty, foreigner-hating Dowager Empress, used to say that this Lion Dog of China knew regal splendor when Europeans were "still swinging from the trees by their tails." Fanciers now generally agree that the dog probably took on its present aspect in the 7th Century A. D., but Chinese tradition holds that it was the pet of Emperors 4,000 years ago. Ancient carvings, pictures and effigies of a grotesque animal resembling the Pekingese seem to substantiate this belief...
Rasputin and the Empress (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer). The most exciting sequence in this picture is the one which shows Prince Chegodieff (John Barrymore) murdering Rasputin (Lionel Barry-more). The murder occurs in the cellar of the Chegodieff palace where the Prince, secreted in the pantry, has been feeding Rasputin poisoned cakes and where Rasputin-under the impression that he is at the home of a friend-has been gobbling them with relish, while pawing at a group of pretty female companions. When Rasputin finds out at whose house he has been holding his lecherous revels, he takes Chegodieff downstairs...
That is the horrid end of Rasputin but not the end of horridness in Rasputin and the Empress. It goes on to show Tsar Nicholas (Ralph Morgan), the Tsarina (Ethel Barrymore), the Tsarevitch (Tad Alexander) and his sisters leaving their palace and being herded into a cellar where an enthusiastic firing squad disposes of them as though they were clay pigeons...
...must not be supposed from these two incidents that Rasputin and the Empress consists entirely of gore and gunpowder. It starts as a pedestrian historical romance, documented with occasional newsreel shots. The Tsarina pats her children on the head. Chegodieff makes love to a lady in waiting (Diana Wynyard). Rasputin endears himself to his betters by curing the ailing Tsarevitch with hypnotism. He acquires control of the government by conspiring with the head of the secret police, loses favor by trying to paddile into the bedroom of an adolescent princess...