Fritz Lang directs Debra Paget, Paul Hubschmid, Walther Reyer, Claus Holm, Sabine Bethmann and Luciana Paluzzi in this adventure romance where a dancer and architect try to survive a Maharaja’s jealous revenge when they fall for each other.

Fritz Lang’s two part Indian Epic is a big, gorgeous, cheesy, sexy romp which runs out of wind. The exoticism and ‘orientalism’ feels relatively sincere though the constant use of actors in brown face lets it down. The first film is a string of really strong set pieces. The second film feels too repetitive to be a conclusion. It should be a blast, not a holding pattern. Less happens, we run around in circles. Does Lang have anything interesting to say about western modernity in colonial India? The German architect hero is hired to take an ancient city of ornate higgledy-piggledy beauty and time honoured tradition then impose straightness and order to it. He fails. But he finds love. The beautiful Debra Paget in various states of glitzy undress undulating provocatively to Indian music. The scene where she must seduce a snake to save her life is… memorable. Of it’s time, expensive trash, pop art.

7/6

You can follow me on Letterboxd here https://letterboxd.com/BobbyCarroll