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Dishonored (1931)

Director: Josef von Sternberg

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Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

'1915...Strange figures emerge from the rubble of the Austrian Empire': among them X-27 (Dietrich) and H-14 (McLaglen), military spies and best-loving enemies. Sternberg's absurd espionage melodrama is just one more peg on which to hang his familiar, outrageous pictorial stylistics and to extend his fetishisation of Marlene - yet the result is amazing. Beyond improbability lies another of Sternberg's systematic examinations of the feminine mystique, and the tragedy of a woman sacrificed on the altar of her sexualty. Right on the surface lies the inevitable patina of telling innuendo; in one deliciously transparent scene, Marlene is betrayed by her own pussy(cat), which eventually lands up safe in the arms of the church as Marlene is shot for her sins.

Author: PT

Time Out Film Guide


User reviews of this film

  • valerie said...
    Posted on Nov 02 2009 21:42 I discovered this film and was amazed at the way it made, the very long fades out, the fact that the music is mostly in, and made by Dietrich as if it was a pause in the course of events to express feeling! the last scene is also mythic camp, extremelly moving, sexy, political... The cat is indeed a very interesting character too :)
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