THE THIEF OF BAGDAD (1940)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *superior*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, psychological, sociological*

Just to get the encomium out of the way, the 1940 THIEF OF BAGDAD remains the greatest magical fantasy ever committed to the cinematic medium. Not even the excellent 1924 Douglas Fairbanks original, on which the 1940 film is modeled, equals the Alexander Korda production for visual spectacle, subtlety of wit, and fine performances. From start to finish the Korda movie feels as if it were spun out of a web of Jungian archetypes, not painstakingly assembled from the prolonged efforts of the producer and his crew over the course of two years, frequently interrupted by the realities of a horrific world war.

Michael Powell, one of the credited directors of THIEF, said in his autobiography that the true author of the movie was not any writer or director, but Korda himself. I acknowledge that the producer's love of spectacle and adventure informs the film from start to finish. And we'll never know that much about the mundane origins of the movies, since, as critic Bruce Eder explained on the Criterion DVD, most of the production notes have been lost to the mists of time. All that said, I have my considered opinion as to who shaped THIEF to meet Korda's specifications. Of the two writers in the official credits, one, British comedian Miles Malleson (who also portrayed the film's dotty old Sultan), was primarily there to provide dialogue according to Eder. That suggests to me that the primary person responsible for re-forging the scenarios of the 1924 film into something pleasing to Alexander Korda was probably the other credited writer, Korda's fellow Hungarian Lajos Biro. Korda had already worked with Biro on several features, not least co-scripting THE DRUM, Korda's second movie with Indian actor Sabu. Biro, a highly regarded novelist and playwright, seems to added many levels of symbolic complexity to the already impressive script for the 1924 original.

Almost every review comparing 1924 to 1940 starts by remarking on the fact that Douglas Fairbanks is at once Ahmed, the titular Thief of Bagdad, and the romantic lead, *and* a martial hero. These functions in the Korda film are divided between Sabu's character Abu, both the titular thief and a young man in love with the idea of heroism, while the romantic lead is Ahmed, King of Bagdad (John Justin). Reviewers don't mention quite as often that in the early part of the 1924 film, Ahmed has a partner of sorts, a fellow thief who performs a few of the same narrative functions as the 1940 Abu. Since the helper-thief has no name in the 1924 film (though he does in the movie novelization), I'm going to dub him "Abu" as well, the better to bring out some of the narratological parallels between the original and the free-form adaptation.

Both Abus function to help the two Ahmeds gain access to the princess, the main bone of contention between the romantic lead and the villain in both films. 1940 Abu has clearly been built up to spotlight the burgeoning popularity of Sabu in his previous two Korda films, and he takes on the role of martial hero as well. 1924 Ahmed, to compete with the villain (and two other, almost superfluous suitors) for the princess' hand, must go on a dazzling journey into magical netherworlds to gain a prize in order to win the suitor-contest. 1940 Abu takes over the function of journeying into magical worlds, and one of his most impressive feats, scaling the Kali-like statue of the Goddess of Dawn, is borrowed not from the feats of 1924 Ahmed but from the deed of a nameless minion, commanded to climb a similar statue by one of the competing suitors. 

Other comparisons abound, such as the motivations of the respective villains. The Mongol Prince of 1924 doesn't actually care about the princess; he mainly wants to conquer Bagdad and add it to his empire. Jaffar of 1940 (Conrad Veidt) is, like the romantic lead, completely in love with the beautiful and unnamed royal (June Duprez), and Jaffar's main reason for usurping Ahmed's rulership of Bagdad is to bring the Princess under his sway. But the most important comparison is that while the 1924 THIEF is full of gorgeous spectacles meant to be looked at, the structure of the 1940 THIEF is all about the actual dynamics of what human beings see, and how they relate to what they see.

Biro, my theoretical architect, probably built on a key idea of both movies, that the romantic lead falls in love with the princess at first sight, as does she with him. But in 1940 one of the first visuals presented to the film-audience is that of an enormous eye, an oculus, painted on the front of a sailing-ship. The visual of the oculus dissolves into the face of the ship's commander Jaffar, first seen aiming his steely gaze at the audience, the lower part of his face masked. 

This intro contrasts with the introduction of romantic lead Ahmed, first seen as a blind man begging in the streets of Bagdad with his faithful dog. We later learn that Jaffar both blinded Ahmed and turned his companion Abu into a dog, and then turned them loose as an "insurance policy" against the return of the then-missing princess. (All this takes place as part of an "in media res" structure within the Korda film, which is utterly unlike the Fairbanks template.)

Despite the fact that the Sultan has gone to great lengths to prevent anyone from seeing his daughter, Jaffar is also given a "first look" of the princess to parallel that of Ahmed. In various ARABIAN NIGHTS, male protagonists may fall in love with a female from seeing no more than a portrait of the female's beauty. That's the way Ahmed encounters the Princess of Basra, seeing her from afar and being instantly stricken with fairy-tale love. Jaffar, as he later tells the Sultan, also sees the Princess from afar, but through the medium of a crystal. (Another seeing-crystal, the Eye of the Goddess, will later be instrumental in Jaffar's undoing.) But whereas Jaffar goes to the Princess' father to make a deal for her hand, Ahmed, with Abu's help, gains access to the hortus conclusus where the Princess gambols with her serving-maidens. So Ahmed penetrates her female space, in a broad sense, but he does so to give her a close-up look at HIM. Even his playful pretense of being a genie is not a real deception, since it only lasts a few seconds-- and even before Ahmed begins his imposture, the Princess is clearly discontented with her hothouse-flower confinement. When Genie-Ahmed asks why she doesn't run from a supposed supernatural being the way her maids do, her significant reply is "I want to look." 

It should be said that although 1940 Abu is just as skeptical about all this lovelorn stuff as was 1924 Abu, the former bases his opinion far more in his own personal desires. Though apparently 1940 Abu has lived his teenaged life scavenging off the solid citizens of Bagdad, his encounter with Ahmed, the dispossessed king of the city, seems to fire Abu up with the desire to become a seeker of the world's wonders. Ahmed's enthrallment with the Princess dashes Abu's dreams, but he remains loyal to his boon friend, though, truth to tell, the former King of Bagdad is sometimes a bit of a prig. The curse of blindness and canine-ness are cancelled out when the Princess falls under the control of Jaffar, The two heroes then pursue Jaffar, but their wizardly foe uses his magic to separate them, rather than leaving them together, as he did before. (Ironically, though Jaffar's insurance policy required his keeping Ahmed alive, he could have killed Abu with no consequences to his plans.)

Whereas 1924 Ahmed enters the world of wonder to win the hand of his Princess, 1940 Abu does so to be reunited with his friend. Abu chances to unbottle a Genie (Rex Ingram), who, for many viewers, is the highlight of the film, and who has no real analogues in the 1924 original. The Genie, resenting his having been confined to a bottle while others were free, announces his plan to kill his liberator. Abu's wits allow him to get the upper hand, and the Genie falls under the boy's control, at least until Abu wishes three wishes. The titanic jinn then inducts Abu into the wonder-world, to gain the only prize that can locate Ahmed: the Eye of the Goddess. But before Abu can get the Eye from the Goddess' statue, he must venture inside "the belly of the female beast." Is the spider a representation of hostile femininity? Why not? 

So Abu gets his own seeing-crystal, and uses it to find Ahmed. But they quarrel, partly because Ahmed can think only of his Princess, and Abu rashly uses his last wish to send Ahmed, alone, to Bagdad. This allows Ahmed to interrupt Jaffar's last-ditch plan to bend the Princess to his will, with the "blue rose of forgetfulness." However, though the plot is foiled, Jaffar finally decides to cut his losses, and cut off Ahmed's head.

But rashness isn't always wrong, when it comes from the heart, as it were. What transpires oddly reminds me of some versions of the European fairytale "The Princess and the Frog," wherein the Frog is transformed back into a prince not by a kiss, but by the Princess throwing the ugly amphibian against a wall. Abu flings the Goddess-Eye against a cliffside, and that unleashes a torrent of magic, catapulting the little thief into the Land of Legend. Though Abu has the chance to be a ruler in that world (even if he apparently would only be ruling a bunch of stately old men), he uses his thief-skills again, to abscond with two vital weapons, with which he overcomes Jaffar.

This long post could have been many times longer if I tried to explicate all the complex symbolism I attribute to Lajos Biro. I've also been obliged to skimp on celebrating the note-perfect performances of the main players, all of whom also mold themselves to be virtual folktale archetypes, but with all sorts of witty modern touches. No magical fantasy before the 1940 THIEF comes close to its mythic power, and only a tiny number of other fantasy-films even touch the border of its flying carpet.