The Blue Angel

Saw The Blue Angel, a black and white film starring Marlene Dietrich. It follows a puffed-up fussy little professor who falls for a show-girl. The film first establishes the professor's character in a complex way: He is merrily whistling to his pet bird over coffee. The bird is not whistling back however and upon investigation, he discovers his bird is dead. Stricken, he holds it's body in his hand until his landlady brusquely tosses into the fire, noting "it stopped singing a long time ago anyway." This establishes the professor as fussy, vaguely effeminate, buffoonish, but also childish and tender-hearted. The plot of this film sounds like a dirty joke and for the first half of the film I was worried about who the joke was going to be on. Was the professor going to be fleeced by a sequined jezebel or would she bring some love and warmth into this absurd old man's life? Well, the film was made in the 30s, so that should answer that.

Indeed, this film is a tragedy. At first the professor is humbled for the better by his infatuation with the showgirl. He is made ridiculous, but doesn't mind burning off some of his dignity. The pork is whittled away from his personality. As the film goes on however, we hit the natural ending if this was meant to be a film about the saving power of love, and there's still an ominous half hour left to go. Throughout the courtship, there are faint clues that things will turn out well: Dietrich has a living bird in her apartment which sings like anything, suggesting a life of warmth and ease, but then again we have a shot of Dietrich brightening up when money is mentioned, and a baleful clown who is always on the periphery, the only other man in a company of women. When the professor first enters the nautically-themed nightclub where Dietrich performs, he is momentarily literally caught in a net.

This film is a fairly dismal morality play, warning us of the dangers of easy women. It climaxes in a heart-breaking performance by the professor in the burlesque show. This is a show-biz-ish film, preoccupied by the grand stand and the shallowness of illusions. We are meant to feel sorry for the ridiculous professor and, I suppose, to swear we will not be caught by the charms of an evil woman. It's very moving and well-constructed but, I think, a bit dated with its message. I suppose it might be considered sort of wickedly fun for a while, but those final scenes were just too brutal for me to laugh off.