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JOSEF VON STERNBERG'S

starring
EMIL JANNINGS
& MARLENE DIETRICH

(1929) As fickle cabaret singer Lola Lola, Marlene Dietrich keeps falling in love again, but, of course, she can't help it. Lured to the Über-seedy nightclub "Der Blaue Engel" (it makes the knock-off in Cabaret look like Disneyland) to find out what's corrupting his students, prim professor Emil Jannings ends up deliriously embracing humiliations and doom. Transported from America to direct, von Sternberg adapted only the first half of Heinrich (brother of Nobel winner Thomas) Mann's Professor Unrat(literally, "Professor Garbage"), in true auteurist fashion designing every detail of costume, set, and his own complicated play of light and shadow, while adding some sadistically surreal sequences of his own. A major star in Hollywood silents and winner of the very first acting Oscar, Jannings was unofficially banished back to his homeland due to a too-thick accent; ironically, his Blue Angelcharacter is a professor of English. But Blue Angelis most famous for giving Dietrich her star-making and signature role after von Sternberg spotted her one-line performance in a musical revue. Filled with some of the most iconic scenes in movie history - the wedding banquet, with Jannings first made to cock-a-doodle-do like a rooster; Dietrich's gartered legs astride an on-stage chair; her throaty rendition of "Falling in Love Again" ("her smoldering voice and sadistic indifference suggest sex without romance, love or sentiment" - Pauline Kael) - The Blue Angelhas rarely been seen in a decent print or video: this new 35mm print has been struck off the best existing elements in Germany, restoring its stunning expressionistic art direction and cinematography, with new plentiful subtitles replacing the previous stingy translation. PLUS! Dietrich's rare Blue Angelscreen test! "A MASTERWORK... An emotional powerhouse set in a dark nightmare world." - Leslie Halliwell.
2:30, 6:05, 9:40

A KINO INTERNATIONAL RELEASE.

Links:

• Photo Gallery Slideshow from THE BLUE ANGEL
• The Internet Movie database THE BLUE ANGEL Page
• THE BLUE ANGEL Pressbook from Kino International (pdf document)
• Press Stills from Kino Internatonal:
  • Mac format
  • PC format
• Kino International BLUE ANGEL Page
• The Silent Majority Profile of Marlene Dietrich
• Film still - Der Blaue Engel (81k jpeg)
• Silent-Movies.com Photo Gallery for Marlene Dietrich
• Read THE BLUE ANGEL, The life and films of Marlene Dietrich by David Stuart Ryan currently published only on the internet

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Available from Amazon.com:

Blue Angel by Donald Spoto

Marlene Dietrich by Maria Riva

Marlene Dietrich: The Songbook by Marlene Dietrich (Editor), Hal Leonard (Editor), Philip Glassborow (Editor)

Marlene Dietrich: Life and Legend by Steven Bach

No Picture: In the Realm of Pleasure: Von Sternberg, Dietrich, and the Masochistic Aesthetic by Gaylyn Studlar Dressing the Part: Sternberg, Dietrich, and Costume by Sybil Delgaudio Josef Von Sternberg by Hermann G. Weinberg

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