Shanghai Express is a 1932 American pre-Code film about a group of train passengers held hostage by a warlord during the Chinese Civil War. It was directed by Josef von Sternberg and stars Marlene Dietrich, Clive Brook, Anna May Wong and Warner Oland. The screenplay was written by Jules Furthman based on a 1931 short story by Harry Hervey. Shanghai Express was the fourth of seven films that Sternberg and Dietrich created together.
Morocco is a 1930 American pre-Code romantic drama film directed by Josef von Sternberg and starring Gary Cooper, Marlene Dietrich, and Adolphe Menjou. Based on the 1927 novel Amy Jolly by Benno Vigny and adapted by Jules Furthman, the film is about a cabaret singer and a Legionnaire who fall in love during the Rif War, and whose relationship is complicated by his womanizing and the appearance of a rich man who is also in love with her. The film is famous for a scene in which Dietrich performs a song dressed in a man's tailcoat and kisses another woman, both of which were considered scandalous for the period.
Emil Jannings was a Swiss-born German actor who was popular in Hollywood in the 1920s. He was the first recipient of the Academy Award for Best Actor for his roles in The Last Command and The Way of All Flesh. As of 2024, Jannings is the only German ever to have won the category.
Marie Magdalene "Marlene" Dietrich was a German-born actress and singer whose career spanned from the 1910s to the 1980s.
Josef von Sternberg was an Austrian-born filmmaker whose career successfully spanned the transition from the silent to the sound era, during which he worked with most of the major Hollywood studios. He is best known for his film collaboration with actress Marlene Dietrich in the 1930s, including the highly regarded Paramount/UFA production The Blue Angel (1930).
Pola Negri was a Polish stage and film actress and singer. She achieved worldwide fame during the silent and golden eras of Hollywood and European film for her tragedienne and femme fatale roles. She was also acknowledged as a sex symbol of her time.
Sam Jaffe was, at different points in his career in the motion picture industry, an agent, a producer, and a studio executive.
Rouben Zachary Mamoulian was an American film and theater director.
The Blue Angel is a 1930 German musical comedy-drama film directed by Josef von Sternberg and starring Marlene Dietrich, Emil Jannings and Kurt Gerron. Written by Carl Zuckmayer, Karl Vollmöller and Robert Liebmann, with uncredited contributions by Sternberg, it is based on Heinrich Mann's 1905 novel Professor Unrat and set in an unspecified northern German port city. The Blue Angel presents the tragic transformation of a respectable professor into a cabaret clown and his descent into madness. The film was the first feature-length German sound film and brought Dietrich international fame. It also introduced her signature song, Friedrich Hollaender and Robert Liebmann's "Falling in Love Again ". The film is considered a classic of German cinema.
Queen Christina is a pre-Code Hollywood biographical film, produced for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1933 by Walter Wanger and directed by Rouben Mamoulian. It stars Swedish-born actress Greta Garbo and John Gilbert in their fourth and last film together.
The Devil Is a Woman is a 1935 American romance film directed and photographed by Josef von Sternberg, adapted from the 1898 novel La Femme et le pantin by Pierre Louÿs. The film was based on a screenplay by John Dos Passos, and stars Marlene Dietrich, Lionel Atwill, Cesar Romero, Edward Everett Horton, and Alison Skipworth. The movie is the last of the six Sternberg-Dietrich collaborations for Paramount Pictures.
Travis Banton was an American costume designer. He is perhaps best known for his long collaboration with actress Marlene Dietrich and director Josef von Sternberg. He is generally considered one of the most important Hollywood costume designers of the golden age.
Blonde Venus is a 1932 American pre-Code drama film starring Marlene Dietrich, Herbert Marshall and Cary Grant. It was produced, edited and directed by Josef von Sternberg from a screenplay by Jules Furthman and S. K. Lauren, adapted from a story by Furthman and von Sternberg. The original story "Mother Love" was written by Dietrich herself. The musical score was by W. Franke Harling, John Leipold, Paul Marquardt and Oscar Potoker, with cinematography by Bert Glennon.
Dishonored is a 1931 American pre-Code romantic spy film directed and edited by Josef von Sternberg, who also co-wrote the film with Daniel N. Rubin. It was produced and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The film stars Marlene Dietrich, Victor McLaglen, Gustav von Seyffertitz, and Warner Oland, and follows a female spy (Dietrich) for Austria-Hungary during World War I. Costume design was provided by Travis Banton, in one of his several collaborations with Dietrich.
Applause is a 1929 American backstage musical talkie directed by Rouben Mamoulian and starring Helen Morgan, Jack Cameron, and Joan Peers. It was shot at Paramount's Astoria Studios in Astoria, New York during the early years of sound films. The film is notable as one of the few films of its time to break free from the restrictions of bulky sound technology equipment in order to shoot on location around Manhattan. In 2006, Applause was included in the annual selection of 25 motion pictures added to the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress, being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and recommended for preservation.
Leo Birinski was a playwright, screenwriter and director. He worked in Austria-Hungary, Germany and in the United States. As a playwright in Europe, he gained his biggest popularity from 1910 to 1917 but was ultimately forgotten. From the 1920s to 1940s he worked mainly as a screenwriter, first in Germany, later in the United States, to which he emigrated in September 1927. In the United States, he also returned to writing stage plays. He wrote in German and English. Until recently, only a minimal amount of information about his life has been available. Complicating matters, there have been many legends and rumours concerning Birinski's person, including the false report of his "suicide" in 1920 that found its way from newspaper obituaries into encyclopedias.
Marlene Dietrich was a German and American actress and singer.
The Song of Songs is a 1918 American silent drama film produced by Famous Players–Lasky and based on a 1914 stage play version by Edward Sheldon of the 1908 novel by Hermann Sudermann, The Song of Songs. This picture was directed by Joseph Kaufman and stars Elsie Ferguson. This was Kaufman's last film before his death on February 1, 1918, very early on during the 1918 flu pandemic.
Lily of the Dust is a 1924 American silent drama film directed by Dimitri Buchowetzki, starring Pola Negri, produced by Famous Players–Lasky, and distributed by Paramount Pictures. This movie was based on the 1908 novel The Song of Songs by Hermann Sudermann and the 1914 Broadway play The Song of Songs by Edward Sheldon.
The Song of Songs is a 1914 play written by Edward Sheldon, based on the 1908 German novel Das hohe Lied by Hermann Sudermann, which had been translated to English under the title The Song of Songs. Producer A. H. Woods staged the play on Broadway at his Eltinge 42nd Street Theatre, where it was a box office success. The play was the basis of several movie and radio adaptations.
