Pandora's Box: seduction and tragedy

Pandora’s Box is an analogy used by the prosecutor to accuse the actress Lulu, mistress of the respected publisher Ludwig Schön, a victim of the crime, who frequented her apartment in Berlin.

Lulu is perhaps the first personification in the cinema of what came to be called femme fatale, the feminine archetype of the anti-heroine, very popular in the noir movies of the 1940s. Actress Louise Brooks appears on the silent screen and in black and white as a light that infects. She seems to leave the scene and provoke the spectators with their sensual and at the same time naive gestures.

The actress becomes the main attraction of a revue produced by the publisher's son, Alwa, also delighted by the young woman. Alwa’s friend and responsible for the production costumes, the Countess of Geschwitz reveals her clear homossexuality and also an uncontrollable passion for Lulu.

The decision to take his future wife to the rehearsals of the play causes a great deal of discomfort to Schön, who, trying to convince Lulu to introduce herself (she refused to dance in the presence of the editor’s bride), ends up being caught in a compromising situation that forces him to marry the actress.

There's a character in the movie, old Schigolch, who we do not identify if it's Lulu's father, as she claims, or his old pimp, sometimes not so old. The apparitions of this enigmatic master, usually in the company of the acrobat Rodrigo, cause the greatest misunderstandings of the story, a fact that would not be different in the wedding party of Lulu and Schön, where a caricature scene turns into a tragedy.

In fact, tragedies ensue and end up hitting everyone who, in one way or another, get involved with Lulu. She, however, acts as if it were not part of what happened. Driven by circumstances, she ends up going to live in a casino-ship where she is the victim of a suspected Marquis, who sells her to an Egyptian.

Lulu decides to become a prostitute, not knowing that her first client would be Jack the Ripper.

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