Metro Cinema Society: The Scarlet Empress

The Scarlet Empress

USA 1934, 109 min, 35mm, Dir: Josef von Sternberg

Filmmaker-svengali Josef von Sternberg escalates his obsession with screen legend Marlene Dietrich in this lavish depiction of sex and deceit in the 18th-century Russian court. A self-proclaimed “relentless excursion into style,” the pair’s sixth collaboration follows the exploits of Princess Sophia (Dietrich) as she evolves from trembling innocent to cunning sexual libertine Catherine the Great. With operatic melodrama, flamboyant visuals, and a cast of thousands, this ornate spectacle represents the apex of cinematic pageantry by Hollywood’s master of artifice. (The Criterion Collection)

“The Scarlet Empress is Von Sternberg’s most sumptuous exercise in style, a tapestry of tyranny so intricately woven and so luminously lit that audiences and critics of the time were stupefied.” (Andrew Sarris)

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