Dragging myself across the finish line for the Dietrich/Von Sternberg series. Morocco finds Dietrich playing torch singer Amy Jolly, a woman with a past. She meets and falls in love with French foreign legion guy Gary Cooper. Apparently they have an affair although it's kind of tough to tell.
Also mixed up in this romp is Adolph Menjou as the wealthy artist Monsieur La Bessiere. Dietrich starts sleeping with him after Gary Cooper gets called up for duty to go fight Arabs in the desert somewhere.
Dietrich was a very closeted bisexual in her personal life, this is the film where she performs in a man's tuxedo and kisses a woman on the lips after the performance, pretty hot stuff for 1930.
Since this is a Josef von Sternberg fiilm, the photography looks really great and not just of Dietrich. Von Sternberg knew how to play with light and shadows for some very interesting effects. Actually Dietrich in this one isn't really the heavily made up blond that she ended up looking like for von Sternberg, in some ways she almost looks a little more human in Morocco.
Josef von Sternberg did 8 films with Dietrich and apparently most of the films were unsurprisingly not that financially successful. The films are heavy on pictorial effects, especially when it came to Marlene Dietrich but mighty light on plot and entertainment value at times.
92 minutes
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