IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025746/?ref_=nv_sr_6
IMDB rating: 7,8
Director: Josef von Sternberg
Main Cast: Marlene Dietrich, John Lodge, Sam Jaffe, Louise Dresser
"Of the two 1934 film versions of the life of Russia's Catherine the Great, Josef von Sternberg's The Scarlet Empress was the most opulent and exotic. This movie is a largely fictional account of the life of Catherine the Great, but that doesn't stop it from being one of the best and most adult biopics of the 1930s. Directed in grand style by Josef von Sternberg, the film is a visual feast, though it is Marlene Dietrich's performance in the title role that has given the film its enduring appeal. A truer account of the life of Catherine the Great probably could not have been made in the U.S. in the 1930s. Nonetheless, The Scarlet Empress is unusually frank and occasionally suggestive.
This version has even less to do with accuracy than Paul Czinner's Catherine the Great of the same year, which starred Elizabeth Bergner. Watch for Dietrich's real-life daughter Maria Sieber (aka Maria Riva) as the 7-year-old Catherine in the early scenes.
A self-proclaimed 'relentless excursion into style', the pair's sixth collaboration (which was the last between von Sternberg and Dietrich) follows the exploits of Princess Sophia (Dietrich) as she evolves from trembling innocent to cunning sexual libertine Catherine the Great. With operatic melodrama, flamboyant visuals, and a cast of thousands, this ornate spectacle represents the apex of cinematic pageantry by Hollywood's master of artifice. After this Dietrich would go on to make well-remembered films for other directors, while von Sternberg's later career would be less successful." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/the-scarlet-empress-v43090
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