This film's imaginative use of sound and music (and actually relatively little dialogue) combines with the play of light in an extraordinary visual/aural palette. We know what Dietrich could do with a voice, and Emil Jannings always spoke with his face and his hulking, brooding body. The Blue Angel remains von Sternberg's most studied, controlled work, an almost clinical depiction of an old man's obsession for a voluptuous dance-hall girl, half-naked in black-net stockings and top-hat, a lowly being empowered by her lover's degradation. Here are the cinematic lessons learned so well by the American film noir expressionists: claustrophobic decor and sensuous compositions are not an end in themselves, but project the reality of dark obsession unto death.