I watched the version with the orchestral Robert Israel score (which was very good), but the music aside, the film struck me as like an opera. Its story is simple. A rough ship furnace stoker, played by George Bancroft (also Underworld), on shore leave, rescues a girl who had jumped into the water. In something of a wild night, he marries her, then leaves in the morning on his next voyage, after clearing her murder charge. But he jumps ship and goes back for her..
As for she, Betty Compson - what a great performance! I don't even know who she is.
Sternberg elicits moody steam in boiler room, pulsing, vibrant action in the 'Sand Bar', where Bancroft punches out lecherous Mitchell Louis (a simply vile character) who has deserted his wife Olga Baclanova, serio-comedy in wedding performed by Gustav von Seyffertitz, dockside wildlife in apartment by the jetty. Harold Rossen is the gifted cameraman at work, pushed by JVS to try new things but not always to do what the director told him - "We'll try it your way, and if it works out, we'll use it".
Not as great as Sternberg's masterpiece The Last Command, but still fascinating stuff.
And did I mention Betty Compson - what a great performance! She was a huge silent star in the twenties, career diminished thereafter. Oscar nominated for The Barker (1930).
Written by Jules Furthman from a John Monk Saunders story. Editing: helen Lewis. Art director: Hans Dreier.
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