Morocco (1930)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Morocco (1930) – J. von Sternberg

Was it Josef von Sternberg who claimed that he was “painting with light” in his pictures?  If so, Morocco (his second film with muse Marlene Dietrich) really fits the bill.  His Morocco is all dappled alleyways and shafts of light piercing latticework to create patterns on walls.  As in his earlier silent films and the ongoing work with Dietrich yet to come, style is paramount here.  The romance between cabaret singer Dietrich and French Legionnaire Gary Cooper is melodramatic, perhaps schematic, but everything is heightened by the sets, the mise-en-scene, the costumes and the lighting, that brings the fantasy to life (nothing on location here, nor does it need to be).  Dietrich is already her own woman, strong and compelling (particularly on stage, where, yes, this is the film in which she wears at tux and kisses a girl), but able to give herself up to Coop (only after he has made it clear that his womanizing is a front to protect himself from being hurt by her when she seems to be giving in to the amorous advances of rich Adolphe Menjou).  It is easy to drift through this film, taking in its splendours and exoticism (as seen from the vantage point of the 1930s), and not worry too much about whether Dietrich and Cooper will end up together (we know they will) and whether Menjou will nobly accept this (we know he does).  This may not be the pinnacle of the von Sternberg-Dietrich oeuvre but it shows them on the way up.