The Scarlet Empress

The Scarlet Empress (1934)

The Reigning Beauty of the Screen!

During the 18th century, German noblewoman Sophia Frederica, who would later become Catherine the Great, travels to Moscow to marry the dimwitted Grand Duke Peter, the heir to the Russian throne. Their arranged marriage proves to be loveless, and Catherine takes many lovers, including the handsome Count Alexei, and bears a son. When the unstable Peter eventually ascends to the throne, Catherine plots to oust him from power.

Date of release
1934-05-09
TMDB
6.9 / 10 (151)
Runtime
1h 44m
Genres
Drama, History, Romance
Director
Josef von Sternberg

Casting

Interesting facts

The Scarlet Empress is a 1934 American historical drama film starring Marlene Dietrich and John Lodge about the life of Catherine the Great. It was directed and produced by Josef von Sternberg from a screenplay by Eleanor McGeary, loosely based on the diary of Catherine arranged by Manuel Komroff. The film stars Dietrich as Catherine, supported by Lodge, Sam Jaffe, Louise Dresser, and C. Aubrey Smith. Dietrich's daughter Maria Riva plays Catherine as a child.

Production

Director Josef von Sternberg described The Scarlet Empress as "a relentless excursion into style," and historical accuracy is sacrificed in the film for its style. To show Russia as backward, anachronistic and in need of reform, the imperial court was set at the Kremlin in Moscow, rather than in Saint Petersburg, which was a more European city.

A hyperrealist atmosphere of nightmare with its gargoyles, its grotesque figures twisted into agonized contortions, its enormous doors that require a half-dozen women to close or open, its dark spaces and ominous shadows created by the flickerings of innumerable candles, its skeleton presiding over the royal wedding banquet table.

The Scarlet Empress was one of the later mainstream Hollywood films to be released before the Hays Code was strictly enforced. Near the beginning of the film, young Sophia's tutor reads to her about Peter the Great, Ivan the Terrible and other ruthless czars, introducing an explicit montage of tortures and executions that includes several brief shots of women with exposed breasts.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

Recommended