Word: sternberger
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Sternberg's task was to build Rath's character and then to destroy it. Two brief classroom sequences establish him as an orderly and pompous martinet. In both scenes, Janning strides into the room, sits down and blows his nose into a carefully folded handkerchief as if the whole process were a ritual allowed no deviation from a prescribed pattern...
Throughout these early moments, Sternberg prepares for the eventual fall. Rath gets up the first morning and discovers his canary dead. As his cook throws the corpse in the fire, his shoulders slump dejectedly. It is no coincidence that an artificial bird circles Lola Lola's head when Rath first hears her sing, nor that later on, after their first night together, her canary awakens them...
...Sternberg expresses these complex attitudes with practically no dialogue. He still had the silent film director's knack for telling a story with pictures. When Rath glances from Lola Lola to a nude caryatid, or gets entangled in a fishnet which trying to reach her dressing room, pages of conversation could never recreate the moment as effectively...
...Sternberg is a master of milieu most of all: he clutters the stage of the Blue Angel with people, clouds, and animals. The nightclub writhes with activity. So many women are seated behind Dietrich that at first it is difficult to pick her out from her immediate surroundings. This tawdry baroque contracts heavily with the stark, antiseptic hallways at the Gymnasium. Rath has entered a new world...
Dietrich and Jannings turn in fine performances that are vital to the success of Sternberg's visual subtleties. Dietrich makes the plot plausible by injecting enough warmth into her role to justify Rath's falling in love with her. She manages to remain sympathetic until the last sequence and, even in a skirt scalloped up to the waist in front, she maintains dignity. Her singing alone is worth the price of admission. See this film before it's retired...