THE YELLOW TICKET
US, 1931, 76 minutes, Black and white.
Elissa Landi, Laurence Olivier, Lionel Barrymore, Walter Byron, Sarah Padden, Mischa Auer, Boris Karloff.
Directed by Raoul Walsh.
The Yellow Ticket is a melodrama set in Czarist Russia and the pogroms. It is one of Raoul Walsh's early sound films. It moves with pace, has atmosphere, portrays an ugly period in history - with echoes of decadence in the operatic style. The original play was loosely based on the opera, Tosca.
The film has excellent credits including photography by James Wong Howe and screenplay by Jules Furthman (To Have and Have Not, The Big Sleep, several of Marlene Dietrich's vehicles).
The film is also interesting for its cast: Elissa Landi who was a fine star of the early '30s, Lionel Barrymore in an intense role and a young Laurence Olivier working in Hollywood in the early '30s.
1. An entertaining melodrama? The atmosphere of Russia? The intensity of relationships? The melodramatic tragedy for the heroine?
2. Black and white photography? Production values? Re-creation of czarist Russia? Light and darkness, shadows? The importance of atmosphere? Musical score?
3. The strength of the cast? Making the melodrama more credible?
4. The focus on Marya? Her background, life in the town, relationships, family, the difficulties in moving from place to place? The need for tickets? her decision to become a prostitute? An innocent girl involved in a decadent world? Her behaviour, shrewdness? The effect on her? The liaison with Baron Andrey? The encounter with Julien Rolphe? Her falling in love with him? Giving him information? The repercussions for her life? The inevitable tragic ending? Audience sympathy with her?
5. Julien Rolphe as hero? A young Laurence Olivier? Journalist background? Presence in Russia? The encounter with Marya? Falling in love, the information, the tragic ending?
6. Baron Andrey and the embodiment of czarist Russia? Wealth, power, the exercise of power? Blackmail? The presentation of the aristocracy? The oppression of the poor?
7. The sketch of the oppression of ordinary people, the exercise of power, the difficulties of movement within Russia, travelling, documentation, passports? The manipulation of ordinary people? Drawing them into a decadence - which led to the collapse of czarist Russia?
8. An enjoyable melodrama? The operatic style - and the basis of the film on the opera Tosca? Melodrama as a vehicle for the heightened exploration of values and the clash of values?
