Crime and Punishment (1935 American film)

The American Film Institute provides a summary of the film's narrative: == Cast ==

• Peter Lorre as Roderick Raskolnikov • Edward Arnold as Inspector Porfiry • Marian Marsh as Sonya • Tala Birell as Antonya Raskolnikov • Elizabeth Risdon as Mrs. Raskolnikov • Robert Allen as Dmitri • Douglas Dumbrille as Grilov • Gene Lockhart as Lushin • Charles Waldron as University President • Thurston Hall as Editor • Johnny Arthur as Clerk • Mrs. Patrick Campbell as Pawnbroker ==Production==

Sternberg and Paramount studios ended their eight-year affiliation with the completion of The Devil is a Woman, the director's seventh and final collaboration with actress Marlene Dietrich. Producer B. P. Schulberg, recently expelled from Paramount, joined Harry Cohn's Columbia Pictures and quickly brought Sternberg on board in a two-picture contract with the "poorly financed" studio. Dostoyevsky's psychological exploration of a murderer, his remorse and redemption posed an immense challenge for cinematic rendering "as there could be no visual equivalent [for] the author's detailed reasoning and elaborate description of [his characters] mental attitudes." Harry Cohn approved the project in part because Crime and Punishment, first published in 1866, was in the public domain and would require no copyright fees. Crime and Punishment exemplifies a trend in Hollywood of the 1930s towards elevating feature film credentials through adapting classical literature "to lend an air of prestige" to the film industry. The "odd cast", bestowed upon Sternberg, included a mix of Columbia contract artists as well as "supers"—freelance players engaged without a contract, for a modest fee—that satisfied Columbia's budgetary constraints. Production code officials had reviewed a recent stage adaption of the novel and warned that the narrative describes "a failure of the police to arrest and prosecute the young college student [Raskolnikov]" and that "serious thematic difficulties will be encountered because of the characterization of the heroine [Sonya] as a prostitute. This characterization is a definite part of the plot." Sternberg, recognizing the complexities inherent to the novel, prudently chose to compose a straightforward genre film "about a detective and a criminal." ==Critical reception==

Writing for The Spectator in 1936, Graham Greene gave the film a poor review, noting that despite the fine acting of Peter Lorre, this version of Crime and Punishment was entirely too vulgar. Greene commented that the original Russian story of "religious and unhappy mind" had been altered in this picture into a "lunch-bar-chromium version" with idealism, ethics, and optimism "of a salesman who has never failed to sell his canned beans". He recommended Crime et Châtiment as a much better version of the story. ==References==