This movie shows how good the Nazis had become at using standard popular fare to push their agendas. Not just obvious propaganda works, like The Triumph of the Will, but everyday, apparently apolitical fare that would be consumed by a large general public.
It is the apparently apolitical story of a Swedish woman who, enchanted by Puerto Rico during a vacation there, stays and gets married. Her marriage turns out to be failure, however, and she ends up going back to Sweden with a former Swedish beau. Thomas Mann with music (think Death in Venice).
Yet over and over this movie advances Nazi propaganda.
The Swedish doctor travels to Puerto Rico to find a cure for a deadly fever that recurs. Repeated mention is made that the American Rockefeller Institute had tried to find a cure but failed. The very Aryan Swede, who of course speaks German, does what the Americans could not.
The government officials on the island are incredibly corrupt and inhuman. They must be Americans, of course.
There are a few negative depictions of the Peurtoriqueños, but not many. I had the impression the movie was meant to convince the islands' residents that they were being exploited by the U.S. and would be better off under Aryan rule.
This movie isn't spell-binding, but it is well-directed, and Leander is beautiful to watch. Sort of a second-tier Marlene Dietrich/Greta Garbo. The Swedish doctor strikes me as very disagreeable; I assume he was supposed to look like a heart-throb, but his voice is high and his looks somehow unnatural.
Of potential interest to anyone interested in the use of art, especially cinema, for propaganda.
It is the apparently apolitical story of a Swedish woman who, enchanted by Puerto Rico during a vacation there, stays and gets married. Her marriage turns out to be failure, however, and she ends up going back to Sweden with a former Swedish beau. Thomas Mann with music (think Death in Venice).
Yet over and over this movie advances Nazi propaganda.
The Swedish doctor travels to Puerto Rico to find a cure for a deadly fever that recurs. Repeated mention is made that the American Rockefeller Institute had tried to find a cure but failed. The very Aryan Swede, who of course speaks German, does what the Americans could not.
The government officials on the island are incredibly corrupt and inhuman. They must be Americans, of course.
There are a few negative depictions of the Peurtoriqueños, but not many. I had the impression the movie was meant to convince the islands' residents that they were being exploited by the U.S. and would be better off under Aryan rule.
This movie isn't spell-binding, but it is well-directed, and Leander is beautiful to watch. Sort of a second-tier Marlene Dietrich/Greta Garbo. The Swedish doctor strikes me as very disagreeable; I assume he was supposed to look like a heart-throb, but his voice is high and his looks somehow unnatural.
Of potential interest to anyone interested in the use of art, especially cinema, for propaganda.