Prim professor Immanuel Rath finds some of his students ogling racy photos of cabaret performer Lola Lola and visits a local club, The Blue Angel, in an attempt to catch them there. Seeing Lola perform, the teacher is filled with lust, eventually resigning his position at the school to marry the young woman. However, his marriage to a coquette -- whose job is to entice men -- proves to be more difficult than Rath imagined.
This really is a story of bitter-sweet love and Emil Jannings and Marlene Dietrich carry it off with consummate skill. He as a set-in-his-ways academic bent on ensuring his pupils are not corrupted by the distracting influences of "the Blue Angel" inn; she one of the principle bad influences who wishes exactly the opposite. Essentially this is a love story; but is the love ever reciprocated - could it have been; should it have been? The two stars lead us in a dance that pulls at the heart strings whilst the brain is shouting out completely different instructions. It is compelling, all the more so because it proves to be as much about human dignity as about anything else. Needless to say, when she sings, Dietrich is captivating - and I'm thankful it wasn't me she wanted to get her hooks into!