Blonde Venus
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Blonde Venus |
| Original title | Blonde Venus |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1932 |
| length | 93 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Josef von Sternberg |
| script |
Jules Furthman S.K. Lauren |
| production | Josef von Sternberg |
| music |
William Franke Harling John Leipold Paul Marquardt Oscar Potoker |
| camera | Bert Glennon |
| cut | Josef von Sternberg |
| occupation | |
| |
Blonde Venus is an American film directed by Josef von Sternberg with Marlene Dietrich from 1932.
action
The American chemist Ned Faraday is married to the German cabaret singer Helen. They have a young son, Johnny. Ned is poisoned by his work and becomes seriously ill. Only expensive treatment in Germany should be able to save him. Helen is now trying to earn the necessary money and is returning to her old job as a singer. She performs in a nightclub and meets rich playboy Nick Townsend, who falls in love with her. Helen embarks on an affair with the millionaire, and his gifts provide for the family's livelihood. Husband Ned can be treated and healed. After recovering, however, he realizes that Helen is having an affair with Nick Townsend and breaks up with his wife. Helen flees to New Orleans with son Johnny . Ned takes this as the kidnapping of his son and hires a detective agency to track them down. In New Orleans, Helen works as a prostitute to make a living. The detective agency tracks her down and takes her son Johnny. Helen then leaves the States and goes to Paris . There she rises to become a cabaret star and meets Nick Townsend again. The Paris show with her as a sensation is invited to New York City in the USA . Townsend arranges a meeting with husband Ned, who learns Helen's real motivations for the relationship with Townsend and is reconciled with Helen.
background
Since her US debut in Morocco, Marlene Dietrich had been built up by her studio Paramount as a response to Greta Garbo . The parallels were many: the actress was preferably only announced as Dietrich . Shortly after Garbo played an exotic spy in Mata Hari , her German competitor was also seen in X-27 (also: Dishonored ) as a secret agent who is executed out of love. While Greta Garbo mainly shot with Clarence Brown , Paramount confided Marlene Dietrich exclusively to her discoverer Josef von Sternberg .
But Dietrich was getting tired of always playing prostitutes or women from the demi-world in front of an exotic backdrop. She finally asked to appear in front of the camera as a mother and a devoted wife. After much back and forth over the script, everyone involved finally agreed on Blonde Venus , a mishmash of almost all types of roles that Dietrich had played up to then. She was the innocent German singer, the loving mother and wife and later, out of necessity, the glamorous cabaret star. In her first appearance as Helen Jones: The Blonde Venus , as announced by the impresario , Marlene Dietrich comes on stage in a gorilla costume in the five-minute number Hot Voodoo . The gorilla is led onto the stage by a group of black warriors in chains and suddenly Marlene Dietrich peels out of the fur. The number, which at the time remained largely uncommented by the critics, has gained a reputation as a camp classic over the years .
For Cary Grant , who had only started working as an extra at Paramount a few months earlier, the film was an important step towards becoming an established star, a status that he would achieve in the following year.
It premiered on September 22, 1932 in the Times Square Paramount and Brooklyn Paramount cinemas in New York. The German premiere was on November 18, 1932 in the Mozart Hall , Berlin.
The film was only moderately successful at the box office. The studio therefore insisted that Dietrich's next film The Song of Songs should be directed by Rouben Mamoulian . Dietrich only got involved after months of suspension and then made the filming of hell on earth for Mamoulian by shouting out loud every morning when she came on the set: Joe, where are you? Why did you leave me? .
Reviews
"Thanks to Marlene Dietrich's portrayal, the excellent design, the stylish camera work and the lavish equipment, a film about the fate of a woman, though not thematically and psychologically in-depth, yet fascinating."
Web links
- Blonde Venus in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The blonde Venus at marlenedietrich-filme.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ Marlene Dietrich - actress . In: CineGraph - Lexicon for German-Language Film , Lg. 21, F 4
- ↑ Blonde Venus. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed November 2, 2017 .