Von Raden falls for an attractive woman named Tania at a music hall. She turns out to be a Russian spy who steals important information from him. The loss of this information lands Von Raden in jail, before his senior in the Secret Service lets him out to go and steal some important information back off the Russians, with help from Tania. Whether he can achieve this or not rests on the basis that she still loves him, which is one of the films major falling points - we are given no reason to believe she ever loved him in the first place. Well, we are given a reason - he treats her to a nice day in the forest - but its not overly convincing. Even worse, apparently Von Raden still has feelings for her - despite the fact she lied to him, ruined him, and put him in jail. Nothing about any of this is believable at all, and those are just the main details - there are a hundred other falsities like it. We might forgive these logic flaws if we were entertained, but we are not really. The entertainment relies on the tension of being caught out, and towards the end has some elements of Hitchcock-esque suspense, but that tension is negated by the unreality of it all. Noticeably - and typically, for positive reviews of bad films - most of the complimentary comments here focus on either the cast or the production values - topics which are less significant for the enjoyment of the film for general audiences. But who am I kidding, general audiences don't visit this forgotten patch in 2017. I'm talking to the air.
Review of The Mysterious Lady
