The Last Command (1928) User Reviews

True background sets up Hollywood grand story telling by four masters of the screen!

[Larry41OnEbay-2 · 8/10 · 16 May 2010]

The Last Command, was inspired by a true story… sort of. Legendary director Ernst Lubitsch was invited by a friend to dinner at a Russian restaurant where he was introduced to the owner, one General Lodijenski. This General had fought in World War I, but lost an important battle and fled west shortly afterwards opening a restaurant called The Double Eagle on Sunset Boulevard.

Several months later, Lubitsch was at MGM working on The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg when he noticed an extra in costume of a Russian General. "I know you from somewhere," said Lubitsch. "I met you before," the extra replied. "I am General Lodijenski." Turns out his restaurant had closed and he was forced to now take extra work in the movies. "Funny, isn't it," he said, "that I should be playing a walk-on bit as a Russian general."

Mulling the encounter over, Lubitsch began to see it as a perfect scenario for Emil Jannings, whose gift for portraying tragic, masochistic characters had long since been established. Lubitsch told the story to Jannings, who expressed interest. A few weeks later, Lubitsch ran into writer Lajos Biro, who mentioned that Jannings was not only a brilliant actor but had good story ideas as well. Biro then proceeded to tell Lubitsch about the script he was working on, at that point entitled The General. It was the same story Lubitsch had told Jannings.

The script was written and given to Josef von Sternberg to direct. Sternberg made some brilliant changes to frame the main story as a flashback, giving the narrative a quality of retrospection, with the implications of loss from the beginning. It was re-titled, The Last Command and what happened to General Lodijenski? He was given a small part in the film and I am told he can be observed as a thick-set, middle-aged man with short hair.

Now we have the seeds of the story, a Russian General once a cousin to the Czar ends up a mere extra in a movie about a Russian General – irony. But there is much more irony, the symbolism of the peasants being mistreated by those above them is the same as the extras being mistreated by the Hollywood elite.

The films star, Emil Jannings was a Swiss born actor known for portraying imposing historical figures like Henry 8th, Othello, Louis the 15th and Nero. In the mid-1920's many considered him the world's greatest screen actor. He was often cast in films designed to showcase his gift for tragedy as in F.W. Murnau's 1924 feature THE LAST LAUGH where Jannings played a proud but aged hotel doorman who is demoted to restroom attendant. Or the silent version of FAUST made in 1926 where he played Mephistopheles. The Last Command was his 57th film silent and later his first talkie, THE BLUE ANGEL also directed by Josef von Sternberg was a huge international hit and made a star out of Marlene Dietrich.

When I recently re-watched this film I was amazed to see this old, feeble and broken man shaking beneath the weight of his memories juxtaposed against him as he was young, virile handsome commanding an entire army as well as every room he entered.

Notice the tenderness the director pulls out of this gentleman when he explains why he shakes, because he had a great shock once and then we look with him into a mirror that leads us back to the story of a once great man.

In the flashback we see William Powell and Evelyn Brent as revolutionary spies pretending to be actors. Evelyn Brent was a dark haired beauty with sultry looks that led to her being typecast exotic, dangerous roles as a sex addict who did drugs everyday. Her break thru role was as an alcoholic in the play THE RUINED LADY. Just before tonight's film she had made UNDERWORLD in 1927 with the same director Josef von Sternberg, it is considered the first major gangster film. On a trivia note her husband's name was Harry Fox for whom the foxtrot dance was named for.

William Powell was one of the most popular leading men in Hollywood for over four decades but I bet you didn't know he started in silent films mostly playing heavies and bad guys! In his first film he was a criminal to John Barrymore's SHERLOCK HOLMES in 1922! LAST COMMAND was his 27th silent film and before this he was never a top star but on the strength of his reviews from this feature he was soon cast as the lead role in a talkie called THE CARNARY MURDER CASE where he played Philo Vance, a detective. He was so good in it he never played a bad guy again. Unlike many silent actors, sound boosted Powell's career. He had a fine, sophisticated voice and his stage training and comic timing greatly aided his introduction to sound pictures. He's best remembered today for his work with the charming Myrna Loy in six THIN MAN pictures.

The very first Academy Award ever presented was given to Emil Jannings (he received his award early due to the fact that he was going home to Europe before the ceremony) for his performances Best Actor in a Leading Role for: The Last Command (1928) and for The Way of All Flesh (1927). That first year they gave it for the whole years work and not just a single performance. Sadly THE WAY OF ALL FLESH is a lost film so we have nothing to compare it with.

Sternberg is best remembered today for his amazing lighting and cinematography of Dietrich but I saw watch the actors eyes in this film and you'll see he was also a director of great performances in amazing stories… I do you seek out and enjoy THE LAST COMMAND!

"Let him strut a little longer"

[Steffi_P · 9/10 · 31 January 2010]

1927, and Hollywood had been on the map as the centre of the cinematic world for a little over a decade. Now that it had become the site of a multi-million dollar industry and the vertically integrated studio system had been established, some of those in the calmer quarters of this film-making factory were taking the time for a little self-reflection. The Last Command, while its heart may be the classic story of a once prestigious man fallen on hard times, frames that tale within a bleak look at how cinema unceremoniously recreates reality, and how its production process could be mercilessly impersonal. It was written by Lajos Biro, who had been on the scene long enough to know.

Taking centre stage is a man who was at the time among Hollywood's most celebrated immigrants – Emil Jannings. Before coming to the States Jannings had worked mainly in comedy, being a master of the hammy yet hilariously well-timed performance, often as pompous authority figures or doddering old has-beens. He makes his entrance in The Last Command as the latter, and at first it looks as if this is to be another of Jannings's scenery-chomping caricatures. However, as the story progresses the actor gets to demonstrate his range, showing by turns delicate frailty, serene dignity and eventually awesome power and presence in the finale. He never quite stops being a blustering exaggeration (the German acting tradition knowing nothing of subtlety), but he constantly holds our attention with absolute control over every facet of his performance.

The director was another immigrant, albeit one who had been around Hollywood a bit longer and had no background in the European film industry. Nevertheless Joseph von Sternberg cultivated for himself the image of the artistic and imperious Teutonic Kino Meister (the "von" was made up, by the way), and took a very distinctive approach to the craft. Of note in this picture is his handling of pace and tone, a great example being the first of the Russian flashback scenes. We open with a carefully-constructed chaos with movement in converging directions, which we the audience become part of as the camera pulls back and extras dash across the screen. Then, when Jannings arrives, everything settles down. Jannings's performance is incredibly sedate and measured, and when the players around him begin to mirror this the effect is as if his mere presence has restored order.

Sternberg appears to show a distaste for violence, allowing the grimmest moments to take place off screen, and yet implying that they have happened with a flow of images that is almost poetic. In fact, he really seems to have an all-round lack of interest in action. In the scene of the prisoners' revolt Sternberg takes an aloof and objective stance, his camera eventually retreating to a fly-on-the-wall position. Compare this to the following scenes between Jannings and Evelyn Brent, which are a complex medley of point-of-view shots and intense close-ups, thrusting us right into the midst of their interaction.

As a personality on set, it would seem that Sternberg was much like the cold and callous director played on the screen by William Powell, and in fact Powell's portrayal is probably something of a deliberate parody that even Sternberg himself would have been in on. Unfortunately this harsh attitude did not make him an easy man to work with, and coupled with his focus on his technical resources over his human ones, the smaller performances in his pictures leave a little to be desired. While Jannings displays classic hamming in the Charles Laughton mode that works dramatically, it appears no-one told his co-stars they were not in a comedy. Evelyn Brent is fairly good, giving us some good emoting, but overplaying it here and there. The only performance that comes close to Jannings is that of Powell himself. It's a little odd to see the normally amiable star of The Thin Man and The Great Ziegfeld playing a figure so stern and humourless, like a male Ninotchka, but he does a good job, revealing a smouldering emotional intensity beneath the hard-hearted exterior.

The Last Command could easily have ruffled a few feathers in studio offices, as tends to happen with any disparaging commentary on the film-making process, even a relatively tame example like this. At the very least, I believe many studio heads would have been displeased by the "behind-the-scenes" view, as it threatened the mystique of movie-making which was still very much alive at this point. As it turned out, such was the impact of the picture that Jannings won the first ever Academy Award for Best Actor, as well as a Best Writing nomination for Lajos Biro and (according to some sources, although the issue is a little vague) a nomination for Best Picture. This is significant, since the Academy was a tiny institution at this time and the first awards were more than ever a bit of self-indulgent back-slapping by the Hollywood elite. But elite or not, they recognised good material when they saw it, and were willing to reward it.

An Extra's Story

[EdgarST · 9/10 · 20 December 2011]

"The Last Command" is a beautiful and extraordinary film in the best tradition of classic story-telling, with German actor Emil Jannings giving an outstanding performance for which he won the first Oscar for "Best Actor" ever. Based on the life of Russian official Theodore Lodijensky, who ran from the Soviet revolution and worked in Hollywood as an extra in silent films, Jannings plays a general who is chosen for a big historical production by a fellow countryman, a theater director who he once persecuted in Russia, for his subversive activities, and who is now in charge of the film's direction. From the first scenes when the military is selected, when he arrives in the studio, dons his costume and makes up, to the scene he impressively plays in the film-within-the-film (containing one of the most eloquent critics to cinema when turned into a cold industry that makes either films as sausages or limousines), "The Last Command" consists of a long flashback of the general's life in Russia, when he incarcerated the theater director and fell in love with a revolutionary actress. Jannings would work again for Sternberg as the protagonist of "The Blue Angel", seduced by the wicked Lola-Lola (Marlene Dietrich). Highly recommended.

Emil Jannings and Evelyn Brent Are Great

[drednm · 29 August 2010]

On a movie set in 1927 there is a call for an extra to play a Russian general in a war scene. The director (William Powell) calls in an old man (Emil Jannings) who receives the call at his boarding house. The old and confused man arrived at the studio amid a crowd of extras. As he pins a medal on his costume, he tells the story of how the Czar had given it to him and we flash back to 1917.

Jannings in a general in the Russian army and a cousin to the czar, He recalls dealing with two revolutionaries: a theatre director (Powell) and a beautiful actress (Evelyn Brent). While Powell is sent off to prison (from which he escapes) he takes Brent along with him as a consort. She eventually learns that his love for Russia is true and deep and she falls for him.

But while on a train to Petrograd, revolutionaries overtake the train and kill most of the military men. As they beat and harangue the general, Brent jumps to the front and demands that they take him to Petrograd to hang him in public. Brandishing her revolutionary flag in the wintry wind while she screams to the crowds, Brent is remarkable.

As the train proceeds with its prized prisoner, Brent helps Jannings jump off the train to safety as she explains this was the only way she could save him. From a snowbank, the general watches as the train speeds away across a bridge over an icy river.

Back in Hollywood, the old man is stirred by his memories of old Russia and as the movie scene is set he blinks and stares at the familiar images of war. As the director yells for lights, camera the old man, who has now totally lost his hold on reality, engages in a ferocious scene of war action, raising the flag of old Russia in one last burst of glory, his last command.

Emil Jannings is just superb in this film and won the first Best Actor Oscar for it; the finale is an emotional tour de force. Evelyn Brent is also excellent and gives perhaps her finest performance. This was an important film role for William Powell as well.

This is a beautifully done film and is not to be missed.

Oh How the Mighty Have Fallen

[Mike-764 · 10/10 · 31 August 2003]

An extra is called upon to play a general in a movie about the Russian Revolution. However, he is not any ordinary extra. He is Serguis Alexander, former commanding general of the Russia armies who is now being forced to relive the same scene, which he suffered professional and personal tragedy in, to satisfy the director who was once a revolutionist in Russia and was humiliated by Alexander. It can now be the time for this broken man to finally "win" his penultimate battle. This is one powerful movie with meticulous direction by Von Sternberg, providing the greatest irony in Alexander's character in every way he can. Jannings deserved his Oscar for the role with a very moving performance playing the general at his peak and at his deepest valley. Powell lends a sinister support as the revenge minded director and Brent is perfect in her role with her face and movements showing so much expression as Jannings' love. All around brilliance. Rating, 10.

A window to Hollywood and the Russia of years old...

[FelixtheCat · 10/10 · 3 June 2000]

Josef Von Sternberg directs this magnificent silent film about silent Hollywood and the former Imperial General to the Czar of Russia who has found himself there. Emil Jannings won a well-deserved Oscar, in part, for his role as the general who ironically is cast in a bit part in a silent picture as a Russian general. The movie flashes back to his days in Russia leading up to the country's fall to revolutionaries. William Powell makes his big screen debut as the Hollywood director who casts Jannings in his film. The film serves as an interesting look at the fall of Russia and at an imitation of behind-the-scenes Tinseltown in the early days. Von Sternberg delivers yet another classic, and one that is filled with the great elements of romance, intrigue, and tragedy.

An Unforgettable Classic.

[viswanat-1 · 10/10 · 1 September 2010]

I had little experience of silent films except few and far between until I saw The Last Command. With the great Josef von Sternberg directing and Oscar winning performance by Emil Jannings, I knew I could expect something memorable and I was richly rewarded in experience when I viewed it. Now I have no qualms about silent films and have become something of a fan of them. Three other silent films of equal caliber came to my mind when I watched this film; The Passion of Joan of Arc,Nanook of the North and Battleship Potemkin I noted that to bring the full effect of a movie's message and produce entertainment as well, it is a much harder task for the performers than with sound and dialog. In this film, Jannings outdid himself and absolutely deserved the Oscar, the first for a foreign actor in Oscar history. His haughty bearing as the imperial Russian general and appropriate facial expressions were totally convincing and he appeared taller and grander than himself in real life. Then again, as the devastated,humiliated extra in the Hollywood Bread line he was just as superb. he was able to project that false dignity even as he was dressed up in the uniform of his former rank in the Russian army for the part he was asked to play. The last few minutes of this movie brought to memory his depiction of Emmanuel Rath in the other great movie he made with Marlene Dietrich, Blue Angel, but in Last Command he was even more admirable. One gets deeply into the atmosphere of the scenes, the story and the music when one watches this film. For that, the credit goes to Sternberg as much or more than to the principal actors. The music score was also so very beautiful and made for a great total effect.Performances by Evelyn Brent and William Powell were also superb. Brent did a great job both as the delicate beauty as well as the vicious turn coat in her role.

Magnificent

[LordBlacklist · 10/10 · 31 May 2006]

The Last Command was one of the best movies I've ever seen. Chronicling the rise and fall of a Russian dictator with so much power, emotion, and humanity that it is very easy to forget this is a silent picture. Emil Jannings as General Dolgurucki shows such mad obsession for power over everyone and everything, only to be betrayed by his entire country and left a sad withering shell of the man he once was. The scene where Jannings gives his "last command" was amazing in his portrayal of the sad old man reliving his glory days. The flaring of his eyes, the strength of his stature, the passion of his words are a fitting end to a great man's life. It make sense that the general would die on a movie set since it was the only plausible place left that he could die an honorable death on the battle field. Perhaps The Last Command is a portrait of the first method actor, but that would sell it short because it is about so much more than that. Every character seems to have a few tricks up their respective sleeves, or skirts. One of the running themes is that people are capable of anything, and it shows to a great extent. The general goes through such a physical change from stately dictator to grubby extra that it is hard to believe that each end of the spectrum ever had anything to do with the other.

A romantic tale turns tragedy

[pontifikator · 7/10 · 13 January 2013]

The story is a romantic tale inspired by an actual Russian general who fled his country after the rebellion of the Communists in 1917. The story starts in 1928 showing William Powell as Lev Andreyev, Hollywood mogul casting a film about the revolution. He picks an actor based on the actor's head shot; the actor is former Grand Duke Sergius Alexander (played by Emil Jannings), formerly the most powerful man in Russia, head of the Russian forces fighting against the insurrectionists. The story then goes to flashback, where we see the Grand Duke inspecting his troops, watched secretly by Andreyev and Natalie Dabrova (played by Evelyn Brent) as they plot his overthrow and assassination.

Mr. Jannings won the first Best Actor Oscar for this role. "The Last Command" was directed by the incomparable Josef von Sternberg, who also directed "The Blue Angel" (again with Mr. Jannings), "Morocco," "Shanghai Express," "Blonde Venus," "Crime and Punishment," and more, many with Marlena Dietrich as his leading lady. Mr. Jannings was considered among the best actors of his time, and he shows why in this movie. Evelyn Brent plays a revolutionist conspirator with Mr. Powell in 1917, but the Grand Duke captures them, sends Andreyev to jail and Dabrova to the Duke's bedroom. It turns out that both the Grand Duke and Madam Dabrova want the same thing -- what's best for Russia, and he turns her to his point of view and seduces her. Or he seduces her and turns her to his point of view. In any event, he's a powerful man with a powerful personality, and she soon sees things his way.

This is a tragedy, and the Grand Duke's power turns against him when the revolutionists win, capture him, and send him off to be hanged. Dabrova secures his release, but, as the Grand Duke later puts it, he suffers a shock and ends up in Hollywood as a bit player. The tables get turned when Andreyev turns up as the director of a movie about the revolution, and Andreyev casts the general as the general in the movie. Because it is a tragedy, things go badly for our hero the Grand Duke, but von Sternberg gives us a bitterly happy ending out of it all. The three leading actors all give star turns, but for me the direction by von Sternberg is the star of this film. His long, lingering portraits, particularly of Ms. Brent, showed the emotion and depth of the characters. There are some plot points that don't quite make sense, but overall the movie still holds my interest after all these years.

I noticed that Herman J. Mankiewicz did the titles. There is a rumor that in the vote for best actor for the first Academy Award, the actual winner was Rin Tin Tin. The Academy (correctly, I think) decided that awarding the Oscar to a dog would make the award seem less than serious, and the first award for Best Actor went to runner-up Emil Jannings for his work in "The Last Command" and "The Way of All Flesh." Herman J. Mankiewicz was a well-known writer, well- known for often biting the hands that fed him in Hollywood. Another rumor is that as punishment for one of his many sins he was ordered to write a script for one of the many Rin Tin Tin movies, so he turned in a script where the dog carried a baby into a burning house. The Mankiewicz family has a glorious history in Hollywood, and I recommend reading up on them.

I note that Jack Raymond as the cigar-chomping assistant director to Andreyev is a dead ringer for Josef von Sternberg.

In the movie being made by Andreyev, we see extras being assigned costumes and doing make up to play Russian army troops. The extras were in fact extras assigned costumes and doing make up to play extras playing Russian army troops.

Ms. Brent's costumes as the 1917 revolutionist were contemporary with 1928, a situation which she repeated in "The Mating Call," a movie she made the same year which was also set in 1917. I highly recommend "The Mating Call." Herman J. Mankiewicz has an uncredited role in and did the titles for "The Mating Call." Mr. Mankiewicz repeated this role in Citizen Kane.

Fall of a great man

[Petey-10 · 9/10 · 30 April 2008]

The Last Command (1928) is a silent film directed by Josef von Sternberg.It shows us Czarist General, Grand Duke Sergius Alexander (Emil Jannings) in his days of glory.In 1917 he had all the power but after the revolution and the collapse of Imperial Russia he has nothing.He also had the love of a woman, Natalie Dabrova (Evelyn Brent).About ten years later he applies for a small part in a film about the revolution.His old enemy Lev Andreyev (William Powell) is the director who gets to choose whether to hire him as a film extra or not.The Last Command is very good silent drama.Emil Jannings does memorable role work in the lead.Evelyn Brent is wonderful playing the woman lead.William Powell is great as always.There are plenty of scenes to remember in this movie.Like many scenes with Jannings and Brent.And then there is the ending with Powell and Jannings.This is a movie that touches in many parts.

Truth is Stranger

[gavin6942 · 7/10 · 7 March 2017]

A former Imperial Russian general and cousin of the Czar ends up in Hollywood as an extra in a movie directed by a former revolutionary.

This is a great film, due largely to Emil Jannings. With all due respect to William Powell, Jannings is a powerful screen presence and deserved his Oscar. It is truly a shame that his career ended up going the way it did, because he should be celebrated, but instead seems to be forgotten by anyone other than fans of the silent film / German expressionism.

I love that this story has some basis in fact. I have no idea how close it follows the truth, but the very idea that such a story exists is amazing. It makes sense, i suppose, that any number of Russians would become refugees after 1917 or so. It would make even more sense that they end up in Hollywood, which was growing fast thanks to immigrants at he time.

One of the best silent films I've seen

[AlsExGal · 9/10 · 3 June 2023]

The Russian film director Leo Anrdreyev (William Powell) is going through a stack of photos looking for extras for his new Hollywood film. He comes across a photo of an extra that claims to be an exiled relative of the czar and head of the czar's army when he was in Russia. Andreyev instructs his assistant to have him show up tomorrow and to put him in a general's uniform. When the extra Sergius (Emil Jannings) arrives on the set the atmosphere has him reminiscing about his time leading the Russian army during WWI at the time of the revolution and reveals "the great shock" he received then that has rendered him a broken man.

Evelyn Brent has an important role as a revolutionary who is captured by Sergius, and she is truly wonderful here, just as she has been in other silent films I have seen. She is unfortunately an example of an actress whose career was killed off by talking films in spite of the fact that she had a perfectly fine voice. Her problem was her flat delivery of lines in that perfectly fine voice.

I don't know if this film would have been translatable into sound film. It is very effective with very little dialogue and lots of stirring imagery as Sternberg does his usual magic with the camera. It was inspired by the true story of General Lodijenski, a Russian aristocrat who arrived penniless in the US after the 1917 Revolution and who supported himself by playing movie bit parts.

This film was one of two films that won Emil Jannings the first Academy Award for Best Actor, the other being a film, "The Way of All Flesh", that Paramount managed to lose. There would be a bit of a reversal of fortune for Emil Jannings and WIlliam Powell in life just as there was in this film. At the time Jannings won the Best Actor award he had already gone back to Germany as he correctly guessed he would have a hard time of it in talking English language films with his thick German accent. William Powell, however, gained great acclaim and leading man status as a direct result of the advent of sound film. But even though he spent about ten years at Paramount, once he left in 1931 he never did another film there although he did films at all of the other major studios over the next two decades. I wonder if there is a story there?

can't really buy the love story but still a compelling movie

[SnoopyStyle · 7/10 · 18 November 2014]

It's 1928 Hollywood. Director Leo Andreyev (William Powell) picks the picture of an elderly Sergius Alexander (Emil Jannings) from a stack of nobodies to be an extra. He casts him as the Russian general facing a revolt in his own ranks. In 1917, Grand Duke Sergius Alexander is the Czar's cousin and commander of all his armies. In one incident, he viciously whips revolutionary Leo Andreyev in the face and puts him in prison. He keeps Leo's fellow revolutionary Natalie Dabrova (Evelyn Brent) at his headquarters. She is conflicted and falls in love with Sergius. When revolutionaries take over his train, she helps him escape and dies in the process.

There is some great acting from the three leads. Emil Jannings does a great job and wins the acting Oscar for his work in this film and 'The Way of All Flesh'. I'm not totally convinced by the love story between the revolutionary and the general but the movie is still compelling to watch.

An unattractive proposition

[thinbeach · 4/10 · 29 May 2019]

The whole film rests on the premise that after being separated from her friend who is jailed, a young attractive female revolutionary will fall in love with a mid 40's General of the opposition, and the very man responsible for the separation! What makes him so attractive, you ask? Well, he "loves Russia." So convincing!

It is all an attempt to make an unlikable character seem likeable. We are shown him first as he is after the fact - suffering badly, poor, alone, and seeking work as a Hollywood extra. We are told he's a General who doesn't want to waste the lives of his troops. What a lovely guy! I guess we just ignore that he was part of the wealthy elite damaging the lives of many and treating revolutionaries badly. That might ruin the sentiment. It's unfortunate the script goes this way, for the plot is based on an interesting story, and there is some wonderful photography.

The looking glass, darkly

[chaos-rampant · 22 September 2011]

This is one of the most richly woven tapestries I have discovered on film about film, acting about acting, fictions about fictions. The extra allure here is that it comes to us from the last minutes of the first hours of cinema, at the cusp of silent and sound filmmaking and so just as cinema - then pioneering elaborate theories about the eye animating the world, and so the eye as soul - was about to revert back to the simple machinations of theater. It would re-emerge from these notions in the time of the New Wave; this is New Wave of thirty years before.

The story is so interesting in itself, you should know a rough outline; an exiled Russian general winds up - is karmically reborn - on a Hollywood set as a movie extra to play a Russian general, reliving the past. The framing story is a flashback to his days in Russia, the old Russia about to be torn asunder by revolution, and then we have contemporary time as he struggles to relive the events for the camera.

The story within a story that emerges is connected by the most astonishing panorama of people acting roles. So we have within the flashback, which takes up most of the film; the general acting autocratic from the power of a uniform; troops acting in front of the Czar who inspects them; the revolutionary girl acting coy and in love; then while truly in love - this is a plot point you will just have to swallow - acting like a revolutionary; finally the general acting out his part in the cataclysmic turn of events.

There is more, once we reach out of the film; so we have a European actor coming to America to act in a film about the same, the only surviving film from his time in America; acting again a part he had played in The Last Laugh some years before. As in Murnau's film it is the uniform, and so the fabric of ceremonial occasion, there a hotel porter's uniform, that permits a performance that validates living. And once painfully stripped of it, there is only naked soul.

This is all very potent stuff to see, but it wouldn't be the same without the powerful ending. The general assumes his position on set as himself, and as cameras roll out their re-enactment of a forlorn trench, he becomes completely submerged in the hallucination, memory, essentially the internal narrative running in his mind of the original events. So we have a third layer here, the set as the space of memory and now the eye, the camera, looking inwards to relive.

The motion rippling across the layers is so seductive we may overlook how this ripple is a full cycle.

The one narrative is finally complete in the others, the cycle only possible with this alignment, and so this poignantly reveals both the creative and destructive aspects of art. The various threads and boundaries blurred, are now clear again through an osmosis of the soul. On one side we have the act of a powerful creation; on the other, bitter end, a broken man consumed in the fire of that act.

Sternberg knew what he was doing. Everything here dazzles with artifice, scale of descent, camera magic. The transition inside the flashback and back from it happens through a mirror, the looking glass of fictions that crystallizes illusion. This is the full cycle then; the ending somberly unmasks truth in illusion, heart in mind.

See, if you can find it, from the same year The Life and Death of 9413, a Hollywood Extra, about an anonymous, disposable actor caught in the wheels of the dream factory. I will follow the thread to The Blue Angel.

Fantastic Lead Performance with an Unforgettable Ending

[Ziglet_mir · 8/10 · 10 January 2020]

Emil Jannings was certainly the actor of his time. While at moments subject to the silent era "over-performing" *The Last Command* really has none of it, and we witness the full range of Jannings' performance as the brutish, high-energy general to the shell-shocked ghost of himself in this picture. An excellent supporting cast in William Powell and Evelyn Brent lift this film even more as we are lead through the general's flashback to how he became the way he is. The amazing lead performance and film comes to a close with an unforgettable ending.

A Gigantic Plunge

[romanorum1 · 8/10 · 4 December 2014]

The last year of silent movies saw so many classics that old-timers of long ago thought that Hollywood had peaked. After all, in 1927 there was "Metropolis," "Sunrise," "The General," and "Napoleon." In 1928 there was "The Passion of Joan of Arc," "The Crowd," "Steamboat Bill, Jr." and "The Cameraman." Josef von Sternberg's drama, "The Last Command," certainly belongs to this group. The Austrian-born director's classic focuses on former Russian Grand Duke Sergius Alexander (Emil Jannings), who immigrated to the US following the Russian Revolution of 1917. In the movie, Hollywood director Lev Andreyev (William Powell) casts the ex-aristocrat as a general in creating a movie about the revolution of ten years earlier.

A lengthy flashback, which occupies at least one-half of the film, shows the Grand Duke's high status as it was in 1917. The man was no less than the commander of the Russian armies on the Eastern Front in World War I. Then revolution breaks out, along with all of its chaos, which sets up professional and personal tragedies for the imperial general. Somehow he does manage to escape embattled Russia, winding up in Hollywood. Impoverished, he survives as an extra. The Hollywood director, Andreyev, was a former Russian revolutionary opposed to the conservative Czar Nicholas and former Grand Duke. In former times the latter had even struck the revolutionary and sent him to prison. Now, ironically, Sergius has to take orders – a last command – from the director!

The movie was based upon real events, as a former Russian general named Theodore Lodigensky really did find some work in Hollywood after fleeing the Bolshevik uprising after World War I. Jannings is outstanding as the traumatized general – complete with a head-twitch – a tragic character who tumbled a long way down from his high perch and who eventually becomes insane. Thus he shows his range, from authoritativeness to infirmity to dignity. The Swiss-born actor would win the very first Academy Award for Best Actor (1927-1928). Evelyn Brent, who certainly passes as a Russian, is fair enough in the role of revolutionary Natalie Dabrova, lover of Andreyev who later falls for the ruined aristocrat. Finely cast is William Powell as the revenge-minded director of Electra Studios. Note how impeccable he appears in his light suit. Powell was made for sound movies, though, and not only would he easily make the transition from the silent screen era, but would also become a major star.

Movie pluses are the well-constructed scenes of the cataclysmic revolution in Petrograd, which may have been powerful eye-openers for 1920s audiences. The Lionel trains are used in certain scenes, but they work well enough for the time. However, there are two instances where one can question the realism of the picture: (1) revolutionary Natalie's supposed falling in love of the Grand Duke (although he does love Russia) and (2) the last line, where the Bolshevik director proclaims, "He was more than a great actor, he was a great man." It is quite arduous to believe that a maligned Communist – with extreme political leanings – would make such a grand statement about the Czar's cousin and Grand Duke! Nonetheless the film is a good one.

Emil Jannings as a general in the performance of his life.

[clanciai · 10/10 · 4 January 2017]

I had wanted to see this film for a number of decades before at last it became available on the web. At one time I had the opportunity to see it in a real cinema, but then something happened and the show was cancelled - so I had a special relationship with this film ever since the 70s, when I became a fan of the genius von Sternberg. His genius is particularly evident in this film, with its overwhelmingly human touch and story.

Emil Jannings is cousin of the tzar and grand duke of Russia. As such he is acting as general in the war, when the revolution breaks out, and he is brutally humiliated and saves his life only by a weird coincidence, manages to get out of Russia and turns up in Hollywood as a pathetic and shaky old stand-in. A director (very convincingly played by William Powell, later 'The Thin Man') discovers him as the former general he is, the director himself having been a Russian revolutionary and humiliated by the general. He gives the former grand duke a chance to play the general once again in a film... It's the moment of reckoning.

Jannings' performance is as always stunningly impressive, and here he gets the opportunity to play the whole range of his ability from a glorious but overbearing imperial grand duke to a horribly humiliated old wreck of what once was a man. The tremendous story adds to the pathos and dramatic power of the film, which mercilessly accelerates in interest and suspense all the way until the devastating finale...

I have seen most of Josef von Sternberg's films, but I was never so impressed as by this one, although I had waited for it 40 years. So much is contained in it, the whole fate and tragedy of Russia impersonated in a looming giant of a figure describing a monumental fall from total glory to total disgrace, and yet, like in "The Last Laugh", he succeeds in performing the miracle of triumphing by his mere tragedy.

The music adds to the greatness of this film as well, there is much Tchaikovsky, both the Slave March and the Pathetic symphony, but the rest of the music, which is the greater part, is equally apt. Those masters of music who chose and made the music for the silents were experts in their field and taste - I have never seen a silent with its original music which wasn't impressive.

At the same time it's an ingenious movie about the movie industry and gives chilling associations to later double films like "Sunset Boulevard". It's like no other film, which adds to its timelessness.

Fantastic

[gbill-74877 · 9/10 · 19 April 2021]

Three outstanding performances here - Emil Jannings, Evelyn Brent, and William Powell are all brilliant - and the direction from Josef von Sternberg is superb. Jannings plays a Russian General trying to quash the Revolution, and Brent and Powell are revolutionaries in the guise of actors. That part of the story is told in an extended flashback, because a decade later Jannings and Powell have improbably found themselves in Hollywood. Crowd scenes in both periods are very well done, as extras mash against each other in the present, and the combat gets bloody in the past - but it's the story of the revolution that shines.

Evelyn Brent is simply transcendent, and the way that von Sternberg captures her is as good as almost anything he ever did with Marlene Dietrich. It's too bad her character weakens somewhat in a crucial moment, but it gave an extra layer of bittersweetness to the story. The fact that both Brent and Powell's characters' both ultimately see the honorable aspect of a man who loved his country is touching, and while the outer story is a little weaker, the ending is quite good.

Von Sternberg's use of lighting and close-ups, how he draws the emotion out of his cast and the big scenes, gives this old film a feeling of vibrancy and life, unlike many others from the era. Oh and lastly, the intertitles from Herman J. Mankiewicz were some of the best I've seen, a couple examples of which were:

"And so, with the flames of war crackling along a two-thousand mile front, troops bitterly needed to defend Russia played parade for the Czar."

And: "After a week - after thousands of men had spilled their blood to defend a few inches of earth - there came a lull between storms."

Overall, great film, and one to seek out.

The Last Command

[CinemaSerf · 7/10 · 12 September 2022]

Emil Jannings is masterful in this depiction of an elderly gentleman selected by an Hollywood director (William Powell) to play the part of a Russian general in a film. When he arrives on set, his colleagues tease him about a medal he is wearing. He proceeds to tell them it was given to him by Czar Nicholas II himself, and after a bit of playful derision, they return the medal and the "General" finds himself looking into the mirror of his make-up box whence he drifts into a retrospective of his true self - the commanding General Grand Duke Sergius Alexander, cousin to the Czar and the man in charge of Imperial Russian forces in 1917. His portrayal of this proud, effective man who displays some sense of pragmatism about their military situation, coupled with a sense of gentleness to Evelyn Brent (who is actually the Bolshevik spy sent to eliminate him "Natalie") is nuanced and engaging. As the revolution turns the tables on this once powerful man, we see his character exposed to hardship and degradation before his new love manages to help him escape the clutches of the murderous mob. When we return to the present day, this old, fading, patriot sees his candle burn brightly just one last time... Though it may have some basis in truth - it was frequently safer for European generals who lost battles to flee rather than face the consequences at home - it is a fictional story and I think that allows Josef von Sternberg much more licence to create and develop the characters. Jannings is super, but to a lesser extent, so is Brent as the dedicated revolutionary who falls in love with the old Duke, and sees in him a different sort of love for his country, one she finds endearing and honourable. The photography works well in illustrating the revolutionary scenes amidst the poverty and cold and sparing use of inter-titles gives us plenty to keep this strong, impassioned narrative moving along perfectly. Great watch.

bright and clear both in visuals and in narrative content

[christopher-underwood · 8/10 · 24 August 2020]

For a silent film almost 100 years old, I would expect some effort necessary in order to appreciate the goings on. Not here, this is so bright and clear both in visuals and in narrative content. Immediately attractive from the start, this tale is told with astonishing clarity, never mind that it switches from the Russian revolution to a Hollywood film studio. Yes, film within a film on top of historic drama and romantic thriller. Emil Jannings gives his expected solid performance and it has to be said whether in his guise as the privileged Russian or the humble film extra is most convincing. William Powell also gives a convincing performance as the film director but it is the irrepressible Evelyn Brent who catches the eye. Flirtatious and conniving, seductive and loving or revolutionary activist, she is radiant and helps enormously with the changing story and she seems as comfortable with her string of pearls laid back in the general's luxury rooms as she does later struggling upon the piles of coal in the steam engine. But, I guess, really it is all praise to Josef von Sternberg who manages, in what must have been extremely difficult circumstances, to bring off such diverse an heavy populated scenes so convincingly. Most impressive.

An ending worth waiting for

[mik-19 · 7/10 · 30 May 2005]

Russian emigrant director in Hollywood in 1928 (William Powell) is casting his epic about the Russian revolution, and hires an old ex-general from the Czarist regime (Emil Jannings) to play the general of the film, and the two relive the drama and the memory of the woman they shared (Evelyn Brent), of 11 years before.

Try as I might, I feel it hard to warm to 'The Last Command' for all its virtues. 'The Docks of New York' was indubitably a great film, and 'Underworld' is a film I have always been craving to see, but 'The Last Command' is rather heavy-going. The premise is fascinating, but the treatment does really make the script come to life, except in the sequences set in Hollywood, depicting the breadline of employable extras and the machinations of a big movie production with state-of-the-art technology.

Emil Jannings is, predictably, a marvelous Russian general, distinguishing wonderfully between the traumatized and decrepit old ex-general, transfixed in his misery, and the vigorous, hearty officer of yore.

The ending is great and worth the wait, but in order to get there you must prepared to be slightly bored at times.

Revolution romance

[nickenchuggets · 9/10 · 31 March 2023]

Up until now, I don't think I've seen any movies focusing on the Russian Revolution except for Dr. Zhivago. This film is a great example of not just how to make a movie set in this time, but also how to properly do a silent film. When done correctly, the amount of excitement you can get while watching rivals that of modern day titles. The Last Command is a story of how both times and people change, and once proud men can be reduced to nothing. It also shows how there are some people in life you will never forget even if you want to, and how ironic it is to want to forget someone because you loved them too much. The movie starts on the set of a film in the late 1920s. The director of the film, Leo (William Powell) is trying to find a suitable actor to play the role of a general. He comes across a picture of someone he used to know named Sergius Alexander (Emil Jannings) and chooses him to play the part. After Sergius shows up, some other actor notices his head keeps moving involuntarily, almost like he has Parkinson's or is just extremely nervous. A flashback encompassing most of the movie ensues, in which we see Sergius' past and why he is now traumatized. It is 1917, and russia has lost countless men on the battlefields of World War I. The country has no choice but to seek a peace treaty with the German Empire, as russia is also simultaneous being torn apart from the inside by communist revolutionaries. Sergius, who is related to Tsar Nicholas II, is in charge of all of russia's armies. He is told that two people chosen to put on a show for soldiers are communists and should be detained. One of them is the same Leo who is directing the current day movie Sergius is a part of. Sergius hits him in the face with a whip after he proclaims it takes no courage to sit in a cozy office while sending more men to the battlefield to die. The other "dangerous communist" is Natalie Dabrova (Evelyn Brent), a friend of Leo's who quickly becomes Sergius' love interest. He gives her an expensive necklace. Sergius eventually comes to realize Natalie is much more than a pretty face. She knows that the men giving their lives fighting the enemy are doing so in order to save something greater than millions of lives: russia. While meeting her in her room later, she plans on shooting him, but is unable to do so. While she is still firm in her belief that the country will be better off under the political system she believes in, she can't help but love this man who hates bolshevism. Bolsheviks later hijack a train Natalie and Sergius are on, and he is brought before a vile crowd who do nothing but spit on and make fun of him. Natalie says they're going to make him shovel coal into the train's engine all the way to Petrograd, where he'll be executed. However, she only makes him do this so he's separated from the passengers. In the train's engine compartment, Natalie gives her necklace back to Sergius and tells him to buy his way out of russia with it. Sergius leaps off the train shortly before it veers off a bridge into a frozen lake. Natalie is dead. A decade later, Sergius is now employed by the very same person he hit during the revolution for being insubordinate. Leo deliberately intends on making Sergius relive his bad memories by getting him to star in a scene where he plays a russian general during world war 1. As the scene begins, a soldier tells him he thinks the war is pointless and that he's tired of fighting, not caring about who wins. Sergius is instructed to hit him (just like how he hit Leo) and he does. Sergius then vividly imagines himself on a real battlefield encircled by hostile forces, and tells those around him to fight for russia. He seemingly suffers a heart attack and dies. Leo, realizing how big of a loss this is, tells his cameraman Sergius was a great man. Like many other silent films, The Last Command manages to showcase the emotions of its characters more effectively than modern movies, in large part because there isn't any talking. You can tell a lot about a person by their behavior and how they interact with other cast members. Sergius is shown to be a hard and mostly brutal person, as he harshly punishes those under him who don't obey orders, and he serves no one but the tsar. However, even someone like him eventually becomes nicer due to his interest in a woman. Natalie is the polar opposite of him politics wise, as the party she stands with wants to see the tsar dead (and in real life, soon killed him) but after seeing how much Sergius' country means to him, she knows she simply has to let him live. It's amazing to me how a story so interesting can be told within the confines of a historical conflict I already take great interest in. Going into this, I thought for sure I was going to be more intrigued by the ww1 setting than the actual plot, but The Last Command has such a moving story that it's just mandatory I rate it one of the most memorable silent movies.

A grand, big-budget Hollywood production that unfortunately lets its political and commercial agendas intrude on dramatic quality.

[seanpayne · 6/10 · 29 November 2015]

A former Imperial Russian general and cousin of the Czar ends up in Hollywood as an extra in a movie directed by a former revolutionary.

This early film by Joseph Von Sternberg is fascinating for several reasons, most of which unfortunately are not to do with its dramatic quality.

It's a time-capsule of a very specific point in the twentieth century and speaks with the voice of a whole class who felt a little uneasy at recent events, namely, the long reverberations of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia and the political repercussions throughout Europe. It's worth keeping in mind that many of the major figures in the early American film industry were themselves children of mother Russia and many actors and technical crew washed up in Hollywood after making themselves scarce in their home countries currently undergoing revolutionary upheaval. This was so well-known to the public that the film itself could depict a commander of Russian military forces reduced to the status of a movie extra without stretching credulity.

The scenes of revolution in Russia are fascinating to watch as a right wing answer to the avant garde depictions of the same events, most famously in Eisenstein's 'October'. Compared to the kinetic rhythm of that film and others like his 'Battleship Potemkin', the scenes of crowd violence in 'The Last Command' are pretty tame and melodramatic. In fact the revolting masses scowl and screech like apes in heat. In several scenes they literally drool with blood-lust. The worst impersonations of what people think of as 'silent movie acting' are confirmed, complete with eye-rolling and tearing of hair.

That old joke about 'the masses are revolting' seems to be the guiding principle here. Even the Hollywood extras on the movie studio lot are animals, pushing and shoving, mocking and jeering the sad tragic figure of Emil Jannings, the humiliated former 'imperial highness'. The film itself assumes the moral superiority of he ruling classes at every turn, whether they be Czarist military authorities or studio executives. Even the preening, cynical Jannings in the flashback scenes of pre-revolutionary Russia is affirmed to be at heart a patriot, one who 'loves Russia', in the words of the former revolutionary heroine, whose personality transitions are so abrupt it seems she is suffering from some advanced psychiatric condition.

One thing that seems completely contemporary about the film, though. The camera almost caresses Jannings at every opportunity and he is in virtually every scene. It was obviously a calculated star vehicle for him, a vanity project, just as much as any recent Adam Sandler movie. I was not the least surprised that Jannings won the very first acting Oscar for his performance in this film, not because of its quality - he was better in Murnau's 'Last Laugh' to name just one previous role - but because it was in every sense a flagship picture, furnished with all the resources of the major studio that financed it. The very same thing happens today.

A sad touching film

[eunice-4 · 14 May 2000]

When this movie began, and Emil Jannings first appeared, I thought "Oh no! not another stagey old ham playing to the back row of the gallery." However, as the scene changed to Czarist Russia, so did Jannings performance. Instead of the twitchy old refugee living in a boarding house, we saw a upright, aristocratic soldier in control. From then on, the performance was impecable. Who could not feel sympathy for the General as he was betrayed by his country and his love and everything he stood for. Who also could not feel sympathy for the desparate revolutionaries trying to overthrow a decadent monarchy. The theatrical director who became a film director was also sympathetic as an artist caught up (like most participants of WWI) in a war that was not of his doing and that he really couldn't care less about. This film, made only 10 years after the revolution, said a lot about the plight of war refugees everywhere.