Shanghai Express (1932)

Josef von Sternberg's "Shanghai Express"


Josef von Sternberg's "Shanghai Express" is about a group of international passengers making their way to Shanghai on the Shanghai Express that is eventually highjacked by radical Chinese revolutionaries. The plot of the film minutely matters to the artistic expression of light, shadow, reflection, surfaces, etc. 

It becomes readily apparent at the beginning of the film that the primary artistic confection of the film is that of artifice. All of the characters are well-to-do passengers who are all unique. They all appear to be from varying countries. However, this variance is what displays the artifice of their personas. The rich woman who pretentiously denigrates the 'less respectable" members of the train is just an example of the feigned sense of ego and pretention that permeates the high class passengers. All of the characters are like warped personas of actual people, all adhering to strict beliefs and ways of thinking. Because of this, Sternberg treats the tableau of the piece with a film of artifice. His elaborate scrolling tracking shots of still subjects or his mise-en-scene of cramped images creates very painter-esque images. This further illustrates the artificiality of his subjects by displaying them as merely paint on a canvas of the film screen. Sternberg alerts to viewer to the artificial world through the use of his direction.

The story takes place in China during a time of civil war. During that time, Shanghai had been factioned off between the English, the Americans, the German, the French, and others. The train becomes a representation of this fractioned state, as we have varying nations represented. All of them seem arrogant to their own viewpoints and stature. However, the artificiality Sternberg infuses in the film points to the falseness of these possessive ideals. This also gets interplayed with the ranking of different characters. Not only are they nationally diverse, but diverse in class. It is a cramped train in which the prostitutes can mingle with the high-class. The attempt by Sternberg is to expose the falseness of classification through his stark imagery.


 

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