Shanghai Express

Shanghai Express (1932) is a Paramount Pictures wartime melodrama directed by Josef von Sternberg — watch it online on iFILM. A train rolls from Peking to Shanghai in the middle of a civil war, packed with gamblers, missionaries, smugglers, and Shanghai Lily — a notorious adventuress played by Marlene Dietrich. Also on board: Captain Harvey, the British officer she once loved and left.

The reunion is already uncomfortable when rebel leader Henry Chang stops the train and picks Harvey as his hostage. The threat is mutilation. Lily is the only one with enough leverage to bargain for his life — and the price is steep. Anna May Wong co-stars as a Chinese passenger with her own secrets, adding moral weight to a film that refuses easy answers.

Cinematographer Lee Garmes took home the Oscar for Best Cinematography for this picture. It was the third collaboration between von Sternberg and Dietrich, and arguably the sharpest — Pre-Code Hollywood at its most direct about desire and sacrifice. Stream Shanghai Express (1932) online on iFILM.