Starring Emil Jannings, Marlene Dietrich and Kurt Gerron
Produced by UFA
Professor Rath is an instructor at a small college in Germany. None of his students give him the respect he believes he deserves. After a particularly trying session, he notices one of his students trip on the way out of class. The boy drops a photo from a local cabaret, featuring the beautiful Lola.
Rath heads to the club that night to catch the boys in the act. While there, he meets Lola and is oblivious when one of his students stows the dancer's underwear in his coat.
Rath is obsessed with Lola and welcomes the opportunity to return the panties to her the following night. After some talking, the professor ends up spending the night.
His rendezvous makes him late for the next day's class and infuriates the principal who knows where Rath spent his evening. Rather than apologize, Rath professes his love for Lola and resigns his professorship to marry the dancer.
But the now-former-academic's honeymoon quickly comes to an end. He does not like Lola's profession and takes a job as a clown in her show to make a little extra cash. Meanwhile, Lola seems to have eyes for the show's new strongman.
When Lola's traveling show heads back to Rath's hometown, the former esteemed professor is set up to be a laughingstock. How will Rath deal with this turn of events? And can he retain the love of Lola?
I struggle with The Blue Angel.
On the one hand, it's a perfect little morality tale about a self-important, pseudo-intellectual who gets the comeuppance he so richly deserves.
On the other, it doesn't give you anything to cheer for. His students are brats. The show's performers are bad guys. It's not entertaining and you don't learn anything you didn't already learn from countless hours spent interacting with other human beings.
The big weapon the film has in its favor is of course the fantastic Emil Jannings in the lead role. He is perfect as a professor who believes he is untouchable until of course he becomes the husk of a man upon his fall.
But Jannings is also the problem here. We've seen all of these notes before. He brings the same pride and authority to the doorman in The Last Laugh and the general in The Last Command. He also ends up in the same haunted shell by those films' climaxes. The difference of course is those other films are simply better than anything The Blue Angel has to offer.
This is the film that brought Marlene Dietrich to prominence and I can safely say that she's good here. She plays Lola as both bored with her existence, but intrigued when the local professor takes an interest.
There is one interesting thread that is never fully explored. By the film's end, Rath is forced to play a clown in Lola's show. The denizens of his hometown, whom he previously derided and sat in judgement if, get the final laugh.
However, in earlier scenes, the show already had a silent, but melancholy clown who Rath seemingly took the place of. Given the film's ending, I wonder about that unnamed clown. How did he get there? Does Lola regularly consume men like Rath to ultimately play the fool before discarding them? Are simply seeing a moment in a cycle of destruction?
The movie suggests this, but really doesn't spend much time on it. Ultimately, The Blue Angel is far more interested in showcasing Jannings.
Is this a good movie? A well-made, well-acted movie? Absolutely. Can I recommend others sit through it? Well...
***1/2 out of *****
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