THE BLUE ANGEL

Germany, 1930, 98 minutes, Black and White.
Emil Jannings, Marlene Dietrich.
Directed by Josef von Sternberg.

The Blue Angel is a German classic of early sound. It brought Marlene Dietrich to great fame. She made several films in Germany but then went to America where here career flourished over many decades. In this film she was directed by Josef von Stenberg. He had worked in America and then moulded her career as a sex symbol of the 30s. Further, The Blue Angel is notable for its fitting into the German cinema between the wars. It was a surrealist and impressionist cinema ranging from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari to Fritz Lang's Metropolis. It was sinister, evocative of the mood and unreality of Germany between wars.

The film tells the archetypal story of the intellectual professor protesting against nightclubs, infatuated by the dancer, giving up everything to follow her and being humiliated even to death. Famous German actor Emil Jannings plays the part of the professor convincingly. Dietrich is the nightclub singer Lola Lola and her famous song, "Falling In Love Again" was imitated for the decades following e.g. by Helmut Berger in The Damned and satirised by Madeline Kahn in Blazing Saddles. The film was made in an English version and a German version and the endings differ. Books on German cinema would indicate the differences.

There was a re-make of the film in the 50s with Mai Britt and Curt Jurgens directed by Edward Dmytryk but it was an ordinary entertainment.

1. The classic status of this film as part of German cinema, initial 'talkie' films? In the career of the director, the main stars? Impact of the film then, now? The German version, the English version? Influence in Germany and reflecting Germany? Influence overseas?

2. The influence of the film on other films, on fashions, on Marlene Dietrich and imitations over the decades? Her clothes, style. singing? Her reflection of the 20s into the 30s?

3. The black and white photography and its atmosphere of the town, the professor’s house, the school and the schoolrooms, the Blue Angel itself, the rooms. backstage, the stage and the audience? The particular compositions in terms of realism, surrealism?

4. The quality of early sound, the music, the songs, especially Lola Lola's song to the professor?

5. The film seen as a fable about the complementary aspects of the mind and the body? The mutual attraction. complementarity, slavery and potential for destruction?

6. The film as a presentation of Germany in the 20s and the 30s in the light of subsequent history? The professor, German tradition and prim and properness, the infatuation with Lola Lola, his degrading himself? His possibilities for success, selling out. betraying his abilities? Lola Lola as an ordinary kind of person. cheap. sincere? But her hold over the professor, her destructive power? His madness, being straitjacketed, humiliated, death? What happened to Germany in those decades?

7. The initial picture of the professor and his pedantic style, his breakfast, the bird and its death (throwing it into the furnace?).

8. The professor at school, the boys fooling around with the picture of Lola, his presence, attitude toward the boys, authoritarian, pedantic, Shakespeare? His reaction to the picture and his disciplinary action?

9. The motivation for his visit to the Blue Angel? His authoritarian attitude, wishing to reprimand the boys and Lola? Chasing the boys. their hiding? The irony of later attacking him and calling him 'garbage'. their attack on him?

10. How well did the film visualise and Emil Jannings portray the subtlety of the professor's reaction, his attraction and yet his not wanting to be there? His embodying it in the rebuke that he gave to the boys and to the management and to Lola? The boy hiding? The underwear in his pocket? His complicated response, especially to Lola's charm, sensuality? The presentation of the body to the nun of the mind? His being flustered and confused?

11. The motivation for his return, his fight with the Captain? His decision to stay, his being a guest, listening to the song and being infatuated? His staying the night and his reaction, drinking, love for Lola?

12. The build up to his arrival at the school. the attitude of the boys, the drawing on the blackboard? His hostility. the encounter with the headmaster? The boys' talent according to the headmaster and his severe attitude? The professor's reaction about marriage? How foolish was the decision to marry, how wise? Lola and her reaction? As a character, her kindness? But her being a wanderer? The atmosphere of show, status of show people? The professor giving up everything and going into this world? His becoming Lola's servant over so many years, his doing the menial work? His becoming the clown? (And the preparation in the presence of the clown in the early Blue Angel sequences?)

14. The passing of the years and their effect on him,, the taunts, his giving up of his career. the possibility of a career as a clown? His dressing Lola and kneeling before her? Her mocking him? His fear of return to his town, of being mocked? Lola and her persuading him, her fickleness and her taunts? The gathering of this together as he went on stage as the clown and was humiliated, Lola and her guest, taunting him and rebuking him? The madness and collapse. the audience reaction of laughing and pathos, the straitjacket, his decline and the irony of his dying at the school desk?

15. The irony of Lola, in black, in mourning, going on and singing the same things?

16. The success of the film as melodrama, insight into human nature, symbol of good and evil. mind and body? The historic influence of the film?