The Blue Angel (1930)

     I first saw The Blue Angel in a film class in college.  I can’t recall for sure if it was the English language or German version I saw back then.  What I do recall is how surprised I was at how much I liked it at the time.  I recently purchased the Kino Lorber blu-ray release, which contains both versions, and took a look at the German language version.  I really enjoyed it again.  I’m glad I added it to my collection.

    The film begins as something of a light and humorous story of a college professor who is trying to keep his students away from their wayward ways.  Some of the boys have been attending a Cabaret show which features a singer named Lola Lola, played by sexy Marlene Dietrich.  When the professor goes to the theater- “The Blue Angel” he meets Lola and is smitten.  Upon another visit they seem to hit it off and their relationship progresses to the point where he quits his job at the university, marries Lola, and joins the show as it tours the country.  At this point the humor is toned way down when the Professor begins to fall deeper into a depression. Seeing his wife parade in front of an audience half-dressed, night after night, then openly flirting with another performer right in front of him is taking a mental toll.  It all comes to head when the show returns to The Blue Angel, where the audience knows and remembers the professor, sending him over the edge into madness.

     Books have been written about this film, and I am not really one to analyze a film. So, I’m not going to go into all of that. I love how the film makes it’s shift from a humorous look at a slightly bumbling, kind of innocent middle aged professor’s life to a tragedy, as we see the professor’s humiliation and regret over his decision to so drastically change his life for a woman. Director Joseph von Sternberg deftly shows this man’s decent into madness and Emil Jannings, who played the professor, really portrays a different man in the end than he was when we first meet him. I had some mixed feelings about Marlene Dietrich’s portrayal of Lola. I wasn’t sure if she was just messing with the doctor for a laugh or actually cared for him. The more I thought back on the film the more I think she started off kind of messing with him, but legitimately found him cute and fell for him. When he first asks to marry him she laughs. Which seemed the logical reaction to me. Then she softens and says yes. For a while we see them together with apparent actual love between them. As time goes on a handsome “strongman” shows interest in her she doesn’t discourage it and also begins showing less regard for her husband. The fact that he is now playing a clown in the show and the realization that they are returning to the town where he was a well known resident is just the extra push that sends him over the edge.

The Blue Angel is a German production, even though von Sternberg had already been working in Hollywood for several years. Star Emil Jannings was even featured in one of them. Jannings himself had a successful Hollywood career in silent movies, even winning an Academy Award, but when the talkies came in, his thick German accent ended his time in the U.S. so he returned to Germany.  He worked fairly steadily in Germany, becoming a supporter of the Nazi ideology. After the war the U.S. helped clean up his image. He made a few more German films, but never regained his former success. Von Sternberg and Dietrich were, themselves, having an affair during the production of this film and when they finished he took her with him when he returned to the U.S. Where she starred in his next film “Morocco”, co-starring Gary Cooper. Though Morocco was released first in the U.S. it was The Blue Angel that made her a star. Both the German language and English language versions of The Blue Angel were shot at the same time, with the same cast. It was very difficult to sell foreign language films to American distributors so making the two versions at once made it easier to sell the film in the U.S.

     I'm pretty sure it was the English version I saw in college but just can't recall for sure.  Even though it is a very well known film and was popular in it's time, very few people under 40 years old have probably even heard of it.  It's a very entertaining movie.  It's funny and heartbreaking and is less than 2hrs long.  I encourage you to seek it out.  Again, I watched The Blue Angel on the Kino Lorber blu-ray release.  It appears that this is the only version available on home video at this timeand lists for around $40.