{"id":11197,"date":"2011-01-11T18:57:03","date_gmt":"2011-01-12T02:57:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=11197"},"modified":"2011-01-11T21:25:29","modified_gmt":"2011-01-12T05:25:29","slug":"the-sheik-george-melford-1921-usa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=11197","title":{"rendered":"The Sheik (George Melford, 1921): USA"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy<\/a>.\u00a0 Streamed on Netflix.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> Lady Diana Mayo (Agnes Ayres) is a liberated young woman who chooses to\u00a0travel alone through the desert.\u00a0 After curiously meeting\u00a0Sheik Ahmed (Rudolph Valentino) who’s\u00a0preoccupied with\u00a0wife shopping,\u00a0Diana is abducted, seduced, nearly raped, and when rescued falls in love with her abductor in \u00a0The Sheik<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Diana first spies the dashing Ahmed at a peculiar spectacle where women are being bartered for.\u00a0 Dressed in local garb, she is mistaken as the next auction item when Ahmed recognizes that she is a Caucasian\u00a0female, and though attracted to her,\u00a0he dismisses her immediately.\u00a0 Soon after, Diana’s guide leads her unknowingly to Ahmed’s caravan, and as\u00a0his tribe gives chase, she fails to escape.<\/p>\n

Diana becomes Ahmed’s prisoner and is expected to obey him, and although the attraction is mutual, independent thinking Lady Diana is not used to being led around by a high-handed male counterpart, and the despotic Ahmed is unaccustomed to having women object to his advances.<\/p>\n

Ahmed is blinded by his desire for Diana and is determined to have her, but a sand storm kicks up and falters his plans.\u00a0 Later Ahmed comes upon the tormented Diana while she is weeping and praying, and in a moment of shame realizes what he has done.<\/p>\n

Ahmed’s best friend is\u00a0Raoul St. Hubert (Adolphe Menjou), who is also a Westerner.\u00a0 St. Hubert advises his\u00a0otherwise cultivated\u00a0friend against such unchivalrous behavior, and the sheik begins to see reason.\u00a0 Just as he’s about to release Diana, who’s out riding with her guardian, the opposing\u00a0 tribe of Omair over-takes and abducts her, but before Diana is captured she uses her riding crop to\u00a0draw “Ahmed I Love You” in the sand.<\/p>\n

More exciting than any torrid love novel,\u00a0The Sheik<\/em> combines the\u00a0appropriate amount of\u00a0lust and desire, coupled with\u00a0love and romance, with a strong\u00a0male figure rescuing the female in distress.\u00a0 These\u00a0were qualities that appealed to a broad female audience back in 1921 and to my estimation still work today.\u00a0 Handsome Rudolph Valentino successfully portrays the dominant Ahmed with a quiet sensitivity,\u00a0and unquestionable\u00a0authority as well as wolf-like\u00a0magnetism, it’s no wonder\u00a0the female fans would swoon over him.<\/p>\n

There are larger than life actions and reactions owing to the fact that it is a silent production,\u00a0with just as\u00a0many golden moments captured\u00a0in the\u00a0film such as Ahmed’s moment of truth, when he realizes the anguish he has inflicted on\u00a0his true love\u00a0– closing his eyes deeply with disgust.<\/p>\n

Ayres manages to hold her own against the inimitable Valentino, perfectly balancing the emotions of first revulsion, then appeal, and finally tenderness towards the sheik.\u00a0 It’s a delight to see the younger Adolphe Menjou, years before his role of the\u00a0dapper, bon vivant Anthony Powell of Stage Door<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Typical of a true classic, everything is implied with just enough shown,\u00a0thus successfully festering the imagination of the audience.\u00a0 With the success of The Sheik<\/em>, Valentino was at the pinnacle of his career, with his life cut short just\u00a0five years later.\u00a0 It is perplexing to think of\u00a0how his career may have unfolded with the talkies, into the 1930’s and 40’s.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy.\u00a0 Streamed on Netflix. Lady Diana Mayo (Agnes Ayres) is a liberated young woman who chooses to\u00a0travel alone through the desert.\u00a0 After curiously meeting\u00a0Sheik Ahmed (Rudolph Valentino) who’s\u00a0preoccupied with\u00a0wife shopping,\u00a0Diana is abducted, seduced, nearly raped, and when rescued falls in love with her abductor in \u00a0The Sheik. Diana first spies the dashing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,73,79],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-films","category-online-films","category-silent-films"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11197\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}