Cheap Dishonored (Video) (Marlene Dietrich, Victor McLaglen) (Josef von Sternberg) Price

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Customer Reviews of Dishonored

Mysterious Lady
To be honest, the only reason I got this film was for its star, Marlene Dietrich. I knew it was only her second american film, and her third for Josef Von Sternberg. To see her early in her career, before Hollywood really worked with her, is interesting.
As for story, there really isn't much to it, as it is basically a retelling of the Mata Hari story, Dietrich-style.
She begins as a 'lady of the evening', discovered by a member of the Austrian Secret Police during World War one. Plucked from the streets and turned into a secret agent, she completes a mission or two, then goes after a top spy for the Russians, whom Austria is fighting. He eludes her, but falls under her spell.
Later, they meet again, only he has the upper hand this time. She slips him some sleeping powder and vanishes with some vital enemy info, after a night of passion.
Due to the success of the information she stole, the Austrians win a big victory, and the Russian spy is captured. Seeing him in line, she volunteers to interrogate him herself. Taking him to the back, she acts careless, and lets him escape, committing the arch sin of treason for the man she has come to love.
The film's last section has her in detention, awaiting the firing squad, which she meets with calm dignified grace.
If it all sounds hokey, well, it is. But Dietrich's calm, measured diction and regal posing give a sense of fate and meaning to all her scenes, and the final firing-squad sequence was filmed in an airplane hangar, to catch the unique sound of echoing rifle shots, which earned the film an academy award for sound. Dietrtich's final close-up, just before the fateful shots, is glorious, and saves the film's ending from silliness.
Really, this film isn't the best of Dietrich's seven films for Von Sternberg, not even second best, but it still is something to behold, and worth having in your collection.

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the magnificent Marlene
Dietrich is a fascinating and riveting actress to watch. The way she moves, her voice, her sultry cat-like quality...and in this film her constant companion is a black cat, said to be "for luck".
The character is loosely based on Mata Hari, and she's asked to be a spy because they need "a woman who can deal with men", and she gets them all under her spell.

She also plays the piano. The music, and the way it's interpreted, is an essential part of the plot.
One of my favorite songs, "Anniversary Waltz", is the main theme, but "Moonlight Sonata" is also played, as well as a more modern piece that's a "code".
They wanted Gary Cooper to play the part of the Russian colonel (and how wonderful he would have been), but after "Morocco", he had no desire to work with von Sternberg again, so Victor McLaglen got to be her adversary and love interest.

Though there are moments of dumb plot and script, it's highly entertaining, beautifully photographed, and of course, has the mesmerizing Marlene.
The last scene is terrific. The look, the subtle smile...one of those unforgettable "great moments of film".

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MARLENE AS A SPY
DISHONORED is not a first-rate picture, but it is a fairly intelligent one, and, in its day, a semi-important one. The best thing that can be said for this story is that it presents a uniquely subtle sort of love, and presents it quietly. Concerining the story of a spy who, after many difficulties, finally manages to trick one of the enemy Secret Service, only to forfeit her own life by setting him free, writer/director von Sternberg wrote neither very well nor wisely. Most interesting is the camera work and sound montage of the film. The alliance of skillful director and one of the finest cameramen of the era, Lee Garmes, resulted in a movie always worth looking at. DISHONORED is an interesting antique flick which was written and directed by the legendary Josef von Sternberg. This film marked von Sternberg as an outstanding craftsman in the use of sound and in the use of lights and shadows. Although sound and speech had been employed by films for three or four years, there were few directors who made them more than adjunct to the films of which they really should have been an integral part. The most obvious use of sound in the film is that of making a piano almost one the protagonists. It is used to project the emotion of the person playing, usually the star, and in one sequence, it makes a transfer by which you understand that the code message, written in music, spells the death of the enemy, a sequence ending in the sound of war.