Princesse Tam-Tam (1935) User Reviews

don't focus on Baker

[t1z2f · 6/10 · 11 August 2005]

The key to fully enjoying this film is to forget for a few minutes that it's a vehicle for Josephine Baker, and view it as a French version of a screwball comedy. Apart from the grafted-on Pygmalion theme, the script is really about war between husband and wife.

From that perspective it's really as good as than many similar films produced by Hollywood during the same era. The viewer can then have fun comparing the Gallic take on the theme with the American and English approaches.

The production dance number is clearly an imitation of Busby Berkeley, and nowhere near as lavish. But enjoyable enough in its own rights. Again, the fun is in comparing the French choreographer's way of doing things with Berkeley. And ... think about it for a minute ... did French chorus lines at that (or any) time really have tap dancing?

Then go back to thinking about Josephine Baker. It's a shame she didn't get to dance more, but the dance to Sous Le Ciel and the Samba in the final number were quite good.

Could have been good

[pontifikator · 5/10 · 24 October 2009]

This movie had so much promise and failed so badly. There are only a couple of songs by Josephine Baker - this is not a musical. There is a dance that is so badly done it's funny. The plot is a mishmash of jealousy, revenge, and Pygmalion. A white Frenchman in Africa stumbles across an African girl and decides to use her to make his philandering wife jealous. He teaches the African to be a white European, then claims she is an Indian princess. He returns to Europe with her, where she is acclaimed. The philandering wife is having an affair with an Indian who is played by a white man in dark makeup. The Indian recognizes the fraud at once, but doesn't disclose it. He offers the "princess" the choice of continuing to live as a European or the return to Africa. There is a great deal of material in what's going on, but it's never delved into. If it's not going to be a musical, I wanted to know why the Indian didn't expose her; I wanted to know more about the choice between Europe and Africa. instead, the Frenchman's ploy works, his wife becomes jealous and returns to his arms. Tam Tam returns to Africa with a native man who beat her, and they apparently live happily ever after.

It's an interesting movie to see for the history: the casual racism, the lousy choreography, Europe between wars. Baker is wasted as a child-like savage with only two songs.

Josephine Baker shines, despite the racism

[gbill-74877 · 7/10 · 10 June 2021]

Josephine Baker is such a joy to watch. She exudes grace, joy, and energy, and it was a treat to see her sing and dance a couple of times here. Hey, I could watch her skip among the Roman ruins in Dougge, Tunisia with the little kids for hours, and wish the action had remained there longer. What's weird and damn unfortunate is that despite her character being so poised and speaking French fluently, she's still referred to as a "savage" and a "wild animal" many times by the visiting Frenchmen, who are there to help an author get over his writer's block. They hatch an idea to fake an interracial love affair to help with the novel and also to make the author's wife back at home jealous. Meanwhile, she's flirting up a storm with a visiting Maharaja, who is unfortunately played by a white actor in blackface, with similar intentions.

While the film broaches at least the idea of miscegenation, so much so that Joseph Breen refused to pass the film in America (which is laughable in a painful way, and yet so predictable), it really has the two minority characters being used as pawns, and little more. Meanwhile, it has a painful dose of cultural condescension and outright racism in the script, something I haven't seen in other French vehicles for Baker. In an effort to display her inferiority and need of "civilization," they show her needing to learn basic arithmetic and shoveling food into her mouth coarsely, using her hands. Not surprisingly, it all leads to the old "East is East and West is West" crap, and a conclusion that Baker is better off left "uncivilized" in Africa. Argh.

You might wonder about my rating given the attitude the film takes, but the reason for it is simple: Josephine Baker. She's elegant in her singing, radiant in her evening gown, and owns the dance floor, jumping into a musical performance at the end which, while a bit Busby Berkeley-lite, had its moments even before she got out there. The film puts her down as a "savage" but her presence continually contradicts that, and there simply is no comparison to the menial roles given to black performers in America during this period. See it for Baker, and try to ignore the rest.

Interesting Re-Working of the 'Pygmalion' Story, & A Decent Vehicle For Baker

[Snow Leopard · 28 March 2005]

The story in this feature is an interesting re-working of the familiar 'Pygmalion' story, making some fairly imaginative changes in the setting and details to add some new themes to the story. It is also a decent vehicle for the vivacious and multi-talented Josephine Baker. Although the material does not give her a chance to display her full range of talents (which would probably take a stage show, rather than a movie), it does provide her with some pretty good musical numbers, and it gives her a role that is a good fit.

Albert Préjean and Robert Arnoux make a good team, as the writer and his collaborator who travel to Africa so that Préjean's character can benefit from a change of atmosphere. As the Bedouin Alwina, whom the two Frenchmen meet, Baker's spirited energy works very well. As the story progresses, the kinds of slights and frustrations that her character faces inevitably remind you of the undeserved problems that Baker herself had to contend with in her own life, giving it an interesting extra dimension.

Préjean and Arnoux balance things well with their light, bantering approach. Préjean, in particular, does a good job with his character, showing that there is some sensitivity underneath his somewhat lazy, self-absorbed exterior.

The story moves at a good pace, leading up to the climax at the Maharajah's lavish party, which includes a couple of creative touches. The concluding series of plot turns resolves things in a light fashion, while also suggesting a couple of ideas which, as long as you are careful not to misunderstand them, are worth thinking about. The movie avoids taking itself too seriously, and that helps it work rather well.

A mixed bag

[richard-1787 · 6/10 · 16 January 2017]

I see that the 11 previous reviews of this movie here vary considerably, from positive to negative. That reflects this movie, frankly, which has good things and bad.

Baker plays a young African woman living in (white) North Africa. She is "civilized" by a French novelist, somewhat the way Henry Higgens trains Eliza Doolittle, but here in order to get back at his wife in France, whom he suspects of cheating on him, in other words for strictly selfish reasons. In the end, when he wins back his wife - in a completely unconvincing scene - he forgets all about Baker.

The viewer can't forget Baker, though, because she is really the center of the movie. She plays a naive but not stupid young woman who is perfectly happy living day to day in the simple fashion of those with few material goods. She accepts what is given her, but she prefers to dance barefoot in her own rather wild - but not particularly erotic - manner, rather than to worry about the steps of the latest French dance style.

So the movie is really about the clash of two civilizations. It ends with Baker, back in Africa, happily wedded to a (white) Arab, living a simple life again. Nothing in the movie makes that look foolish or ignorant. Neither does the movie try to make that lifestyle look superior to the sophisticated lives of well-to-do Parisians of the 1930s. They are just two very different, and basically incompatible, cultures. And there the movie leaves it.

Baker gets to sing a few pleasant but not really memorable songs. Her dancing is more frenetic than graceful. Some French folk are depicted as admiring it, others as ridiculing it. The movie really doesn't take sides. Since we don't have much movie footage of Baker performing from the 1920s and 30s, it's hard to say how representative, if at all, this is of the sort of thing she was doing in Paris theaters at the time.

Not a bad movie, and not really a racist one - though it certainly has racist characters in it.

Baker shines in this otherwise uneven comedy

[MissSimonetta · 7/10 · 1 June 2014]

Josephine Baker was one of the most remarkable women of the 20th century. Talented and beautiful, she moved away from the racially segregated US to find her fortune in Paris, where she became the highest paid entertainer in Europe for many years. She mostly worked in the nightclub scene, singing and dancing, but she did make a few films. If all those films were as uninspired as Princess Tam Tam (1935), it's easy to see why she got bored with cinema so quickly.

Baker is the only entertaining aspect of the film. She's charming and funny, and steals every frame she appears in. Her co-stars leave little impression, partly due to having to share the screen with Baker and partly due to their characters being dull, or worse, that deadly combination of unlikable and annoying. The story is a pale retread of Pygmalion and even though the movie doesn't even last an hour and a half, it seems to go on forever. There's even a Busby Berkely style dance number at the end which may be the most obvious use of narrative padding I've ever seen.

A poor script combined with choppy camera-work makes this mostly uninspired viewing. However, Baker's performance makes it worth a single watch, and it makes you wish the producers and writers had given her better material to work with.

Typical vehicle for the American Dancer Josephine Baker!!!

[elo-equipamentos · 6/10 · 16 April 2019]

Until now the most weaker picture of Josephine Baker, apart this was made on mid thirties where they usually didn't make a lavish production, as show on it, something about a fairy tale, the plot is rubbish, serving as Baker's vehicle to explore an African dancing or criticize a usual shallow of the European society, decaying to my point of view, a bit humor all around. largely used it's time, wasn't a movie to remember too often, a dry production, lack of deepness of being thinking is quite absurd, poor attempt to make something unusual, perhaps to Josephine Baker's fans only!!!

Resume:

First watch: 2019 / How many: 1 / Source: DVD / Rating: 6.25

Mercurial Baker too fast to ride in this clunker.

[st-shot · 4/10 · 7 August 2011]

Josephine Baker was every bit a part of the Paris scene during "The Lost Generation" as Hemingway and Stein. Bolting the blatant and institutional racism in the United States she settled in Paris where she went on to great stage acclaim with such acts as her Banana Dance. It was only logical that her free spirit style make its way to film as she does here in Princess Tam Tam.

French writer Max de Mirecourt experiencing writers block and problems with his pre jet set wife decides to run off to Tunisia to get his groove back. Their he runs into lust for life Alwina (Baker) who celebrates the creature comforts with gleeful passion. Along with a friend he hatches a Pygmalion like plan to present Alwina as a Princess Tam Tam to French society and much to the ire of his wife who in turn is being seen around town with a maharajah on her arm.

Strictly a showcase for Baker, Tam Tam does make some cursory observations about bias, class and materialism but it remains centered around Josephine's wild child to illustrate it. All the leads remain ancillary in her presence with her irresistible zest for life providing nearly all of the film's energy. She may not have the formal training of Isadora Duncan but her off the cuff tumblesault at some Tunisian ruins is as timeless as Duncan's iconic photograph without the pretense. Silly premise aside Princesse Tam Tam does afford the viewer an unfettered lengthy glance at one of the most unique icons of Paris between the wars.

Josephine Baker's Legendary Performance

[Ron Oliver · 10/10 · 26 September 2000]

A French novelist, disgusted by his wife's society friends, goes to North Africa for a respite. There he encounters a vivacious & talented Bedouin girl, living in poverty. To spite his wife, who is romancing a Maharajah, he decides to train & educate the girl, and present her to Parisian society as the PRINCESSE TAM TAM...

The marvelous Josephine Baker is perfectly cast in the title role in this very enjoyable French film. With her enormous eyes & infectious smile, she makes contact with the viewer's heartstrings immediately. Her over-sized personality & obvious joy of performing make her a pure pleasure to watch. Baker makes us care about what's happening to poor Alwina during her transformation & introduction to European mores.

Albert Préjean does very well as the Pygmalion to Baker's Galatea; also effective are Georges Peclet as a half-caste servant, and Jean Galland as the mysterious Maharajah.

The film is very handsome & well made, looking a little reminiscent of Busby Berkeley movies being produced at the same time in America - although unlike American films of this period, PRINCESSE TAM TAM hasn't any racism. It should be pointed out that there was no Hays Office or Production Code in France. Some of the dialogue & action is rather provocative, but it must be admitted that Baker singing & dancing to 'Under The African Sky,' as well as her culminating performance in the Parisian nightclub, are two of the cinema's more memorable moments.

Actual location filming in Tunisia greatly enhances the film.

Josephine Baker was born in St. Louis in 1906, into a very poor family. Her talent & driving ambition, however, soon pushed her into moving East and she was briefly a cast member of the Ziegfeld Follies. Realizing that America in the mid-1920's held great limitations for a gifted Black woman, she managed to get herself to Paris, where she eventually joined the Foliés-Bergeres & Le Negre Revue. The French adored her and she became a huge celebrity. A short return to America in 1935 showed Baker that things had not changed for African-Americans. She returned to France, became a French citizen & worked for the Resistance during the early days of the War. Baker relocated to Morocco for the duration and entertained Allied troops stationed there.

After the War, Baker's fortunes began to slide and she faced many financial & personal difficulties. For a while, she was even banned from returning to the United States. Finally, Baker accepted an offer from Princess Grace of Monaco to reside in the Principality. Josephine Baker was on the verge of a comeback when she died of a stroke in 1975, at the age of 68.

Having appeared in only two decent films - ZOUZOU & PRINCESSE TAM TAM - Baker is in danger of becoming obscure. But she deserves her place alongside Chevalier, Dietrich & Robeson, as one of her generation's truly legendary performers.

Good Film but . . .

[jorearb · 8/10 · 8 February 2005]

Princess Tam Tam is without the trappings of racism, in the way we think of racism in the United States, but there are more subtle (to the American viewer) assertions about ethnic identity during the time. Pay attention to Alwina's (Baker) placement within shots, how she is addressed by the other characters, the settings around her that all depict her as a "savage" African, and ask yourself if Alwina has any shred of agency throughout the film. I don't want to ruin anything but at the end pay very careful attention, the dichotomy between "Eastern" and "Western" culture is to say the least offensive, such diction is thankfully disavowed these days. The French have a checkered past as an imperial force throughout the areas depicted (see Chris Marker's Les Statues Meurent Aussi- 1953), and pay attention to the places the European travelers visit while they are in Africa, and what does that reflect about their attitudes towards the "other". I give this film a 7 because I am a sucker for Baker, much of what she did in her professional career, like Princes Tam Tam, that is regressive is certainly overshadowed by her efforts towards integration, her work as a freaking spy (I am gushing, sorry.) However the film for me is captivating because of her performance, besides that it is a telling relic of bygone mentalities.

Baker's generosity was legend in France...

[dbdumonteil · 18 June 2006]

....but the parts she was offered were really poor."Princesse Tam-Tam" directed by third-rate artist Edmond Greville is no exception.On the plus side,there is a screenplay and even an unexpected twist at the end.It reminds me of "Pygmalion" sometimes as one user has already pointed out.

But the main reason is to show Baker in the music hall where she belongs.There's a long scene there and it may bore people who do not like this kind of show.

There's no real racism,but the natives from Africa are looked upon as "big children" by the white man .Who could blame the script writers? In Hergé's comic strip "Tintin au Congo" ,at the beginning of the thirties ,it was all the same.

A lovely film.

[gkeith_1 · 10/10 · 28 January 2016]

Observations of this film: Lovely. Nice visuals. Stunning production values. Baker treated with respect, even though the white people still thought they were better. My Fair Lady? Yessssssss. Dress you up in nice clothes. Get your nails done. Teach you to eat with a fork. Teach you arithmetic, dancing, piano playing. Set your hair professionally. Sauvage? Non, mon ami. Civilisation? Oui. Yes, for awhile. Le Professeur Henry Higgins knows everything (not).

Henry Higgins is a jackass, oui. Just like the one who wants to eat his novel (spoiler).

Alas, a lot of this film was only a fantasy, as storyline of a novel. Baker being given the villa was no joke. The animals in the house were nice. An animal (donkey) eats the front page of Max's new book, named "Civilisation", and that is quite humorous.

Baker has a baby with Dar? Are she and Dar married? Do they believe in such a thing? Who knows? They look very happy.

I enjoyed Baker's dancing and singing. I thought Baker was supposed to have been an exotic/sensual dancer, but her dancing here appeared to be quite tame -- even though very lovely, in my opinion. I realize that the Hays Code did not exist in France, however.

I loved Baker's beautiful clothes at the horse races (Ascot Gavotte), in the fantasy sequences.

During this same time period in the United States, African American actresses were playing maid and mammy parts, and African American men were playing servants and shoeshine persons. There was no respect, I tell ya, there was no respect. One famous African American actress won an Oscar for portraying a maid in a film, she who said something like, "I would rather get paid lots of money for playing a maid, than being one in real life."

Baker, however, was the star of this film, Princesse Tam Tam, and had several glamorous scenes in this film, which was French and not American. Baker was groomed and pretended to be an exotic Black Princess, and was not telling a spoiled brat, sassy white Southern plantation owner's daughter to "behave, Miz Scahlett."

Did Henry Higgins ever give Eliza Doolittle a mansion? It never happened.

10/10

Princesse Tam-Tam was perhaps the best movie showcase for Josephine Baker

[tavm · 9/10 · 8 February 2019]

After watching her previous film, Zouzou, I then decided to watch Josephine Baker's next one from France, Princesse Tam-Tam. Once again, I ended up watching without English subtitles (though this time, there was no option to do so on this YouTube upload) so I first read the synopsis on the Wikipedia page. Even with that, I wasn't able to completely follow what was going on but I understood enough as a result. Anyway, the highlights are Ms. Baker's numbers whether on a boat, in a bar with a band consisting of members of her race, and especially at the climax in a more swanky restaurant. The fact that her then-husband was involved in this movie probably is why it's such a joy to watch whenever Ms. Baker sings and dances in it. So on that note, Princesse Tam-Tam is well worth seeing!

Excellent

[dcarroll74 · 10/10 · 3 February 2022]

I never thought I would ever see Josephine Baker in action, and only know of her through history. I finally found this movie, downloaded it, and enjoyed.

As some of the other reviers have right ascertained, it has a Pygmalian style to the story. It also has a French farce style as well. However, it would appear that the movie was also glossed over.

There was however, a scene whereby, racism was starkly raised, and not seen by most. It refered to the reference of dress (hidden meaning).

Aside from it all, I can now safely say, after all I have seen and read of Josephine, in February 2022, I have seen all that was talked about, and I admire, and then some.

I knew she was beautiful, I knew she could dance (she was athletic, I used to dance). I never knew she acted, and I definitely didn't know she could sing. What a hell of a Soprano voice she had.

Delighted I could put motion and voice to a part of history that some would rather forget. Shame on them, she was a flipping pioneer.

Luscious Josephine Baker

[DKosty123 · 28 July 2011]

While the print I saw of this film no doubt reflects the 1935 being rough and grainy, the film is an important one. In 1935, the French film criticizes the French for not being as sophisticated as they were telling everyone they were. As for Baker, I have no doubt that even with the grainy film, she was one talented bombshell who was not given enough chance in the US to cross the segregation line.

Her dancing and seduction scenes in this movie are really over the top. This French film with English subtitles from KINO has a lot of good stuff, just crude production standards. France at this point did not have the budgets that Hollywood already had or this film would be better.

Baker portrays a Arab Princess who is wild and untamed. Like the Henry Higgins -Liza DoLittle story, two men try to convert her into a cultured creature. In the end, she sheds the culture in one great dance sequence and earns the applause of all present.

There are a lot of women extras in this film, and some dance sequences that are shot from above reminding me of the weekly June Taylor Dancers on the Jackie Gleason show. For an obviously limited budget, these sequences are quite good.

Interesting to note that in 1940 Moulin Rouge Baker would play a character known as Princess Tam-Tam. In a way, that might be the only tie between these films. After seeing Baker in this, I feel I should check out that 1940 Moulin Rouge. She should fit right into any good version of that story. Too bad she only has a small supporting role in that one.