Cubussoli Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Solemplex To me, this movie is perfection.

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Derry Herrera Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

TheLittleSongbird Of the seven Marlene Dietrich/Josef Von Sternberg film, a partnership that is justifiably famous, collaborations, 'Blonde Venus' is the fifth. To me also, it's the weakest but still not by all means a bad film. Far from it, if not for all tastes, just that they also had great films like 'Shanghai Express' and 'The Scarlet Empress' and 'Blonde Venus' in comparison comes up short.The story is silly nonsense, and does get rather too melodramatic and overwrought even for the 30s in the middle and muddled in a few of the latter scenes where it doesn't make as much sense as it ought to. The ending doesn't ring true, and the decision considering what happens in the rest of the film feels illogical. As great an actor as Cary Grant was, not many actors could do charming, urbane and suave better, this was an early role and one that despite the dashing charm he brought to it doesn't do anything for him, it's too much of a plot device sort of role that comes in and out of the story.However, Dietrich is luminous and touching, making a real effort to make a real character out of the only really developed character in the whole film. Dickie Moore is cute and very natural, and Herbert Marshall plays a somewhat thankless role that barely stretches him valiantly down pat and makes him a conflicted character. Hattie McDaniel is a hoot as ever.Staging of the songs are more memorable than the songs themselves, though they are nice enough on their own. Just that the dazzling staging of the "Hot Voodoo" numbers packs more punch than the song itself for instance, Dietrich and a gorilla suit proves to be an iconic moment.The beginning of the film is also very daring and racy, remarkably so. A sharp, double-edged and sophisticated script helps too, as does Sternberg's adroit direction. As always with a Sternberg film, 'Blonde Venus' looks great. Not just the striking use of light and shadow lighting and the sumptuous settings and costuming but especially the pure imaginative classiness that is the cinematography.In summary, quite good but not great like other Dietrich/Sternberg films are. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Michael_Elliott Blonde Venus (1932) *** (out of 4) Helen Faraday (Marlene Dietrich) learns that her husband Edward (Herbert Marshall) is dying of radiation poison but there's a doctor who might be able to save him. The only problem is that they don't have the money so she goes back to working as a cabaret singer where she meets millionaire Nick Townsend (Cary Grant). At first Helen is just after the money to save her husband but soon her and Nick fall in love.Dietrich and director Joseph von Sternberg once again create a winning film that manages to be highly entertaining even though some pretty big flaws. Even though the film does have some flaws there's no question that the cast is terrific and once again the director offers up a beautiful looking film to say the least.The biggest problem with the movie is how melodramatic it gets in the middle. There's a long subplot dealing with the husband snapping after he learns of the affair and Dietrich takes off with the kid. This is where we see her struggling to do anything good for the kid as she has to keep avoiding detectives and others who are looking for her. I found all of this stuff to be rather silly because it makes the husband out to be an incredible villain and for the life of me it just didn't make too much sense.It didn't make too much sense in many reasons because this was a Pre-code and it did feature a woman cheating on her husband with several men and she was made for the viewer to root for. A lot of credit has to go to Dietrich because she's extremely strong here. She's given a couple musical numbers that she nails just fine but I was really impressed with her dramatic work and especially her love for her son. Marshall is great playing the bad guy and Grant is wonderfully charming in his part. The early romance scenes between he and Dietrich are certainly the highlight of the film. Dickie Moore is also good in his role as the son.BLONDE VENUS isn't a masterpiece but it's certainly an entertaining film. Yes it has some major plot flaws but there's no doubt that fans of Dietrich and Grant will enjoy it.

Nicole C Maybe it is because I am used to the films nowadays that I just can't see how these olden films are seen as 'masterpieces'.Not so much Marlene Dietrich, but the acting in this film was horrible. I was literally cringing. The beginning half was worst, and even Dietrich felt a little awkward, but the worst was when Herbert Marshall was speaking. It was too flat and forced. Dickie Moore who was a kid at the time was better than most actors in this.Dietrich did play her character better during the second half, as she carries the film on her shoulders. She portrays her character really well, and the connection between her and Moore as mother and son was prominent. Her character is the only one who is given detail in the film and nothing much is known about the others.I watched this film for my film theory class, and the theory connected with this was the image of the woman in the cinema. If you've read some of my other reviews, you would know not to get me started on the sexism and inequality in films. Let's just say that even though this film is centred on a female star, she is basically portrayed as a whore (and an object to look at), and a bad mother because she is not supposed to work and care for her son at the same time. Plus, this didn't even pass the Bechdel test (not that it's a good indicator of gender equality in films, but it is definitely something to think about).Read more movie reviews at: championangels.wordpress.com

timmy_501 Josef Von Sternberg's films of the 1930s are some of the most unique ever made. Sternberg was one of the most promising directors of the 1920s, but of course there was a paradigm shift with the advent of sound near the end of the decade, causing most filmmakers to abandon the experimental cinematic techniques so instrumental to the most successful silent films. Dialogue heavy films in which visuals took a backseat to plot and characterization became the norm. Sternberg seems to have been the only director to integrate sound successfully into his normal filmmaking routine without completely changing his style. Thus, in a film like Blonde Venus Sternberg still employed his slick editing techniques and Impressionistic camera tricks such as superimpositions. As simple as this sounds, it's quite off-putting to see a film like this when expecting the relatively primitive filmmaking techniques of the popular films of the 1930s. While Sternberg naturally evolved his style and progressed through the '30s in his own way, nearly every other filmmaker regressed to a more stagy film style. It's for this reason that Sternberg's films of the 1930s look so different: this is an offshoot of film evolution that unfortunately didn't have much influence on contemporary films; what you see when you watch Sternberg's films from this era is the style that films could have moved toward if the retreat to the old dramatic forms hadn't occurred. So, what makes Blonde Venus off-putting? Well, in spite of its relative lack of length (it's only ninety-minutes long) a lot of ground is covered in this film. There's a love triangle established early on which is resolved almost before it's fully formed and the plot doesn't slow down as a character goes from riches to rags and becomes a fugitive from justice in just a few moments; in fact, things just speed up from there and in twenty minutes or so there's a manhunt that stretches across several states, several close brushes with the law, and a dramatic showdown about child custody before the character hits bottom, heads to Europe, and quickly vaults back to riches again. This is the sort of plot that would never be told in less than twice this amount of time today, in fact I've seen entire seasons of television shows with less plot packed into them. Throughout all this, Sternberg's visual panache guarantees the viewer's interest and, at the same time, narrative coherence is easily maintained. There's even some good thematic material here about self-sacrifice and women's roles in the period. Like most of Sternberg's films from this decade, Blonde Venus offers an embarrassment of riches when compared to its contemporaries in spite of a pacing style that will be difficult for viewers used to (non- Sternberg) films for this era to adjust to. For a viewer with a bit of context, this is a wonderful glimpse at what film could have been.