Tsirk (1936)

English title: The Circus

A circus artist has a child from a black man, and is discriminated, and even physically threatened, because of it. She flees to Europe with a man she meets on a train, who will act as her impresario. In the Soviet Union, she performs at a circus and falls in love with a local performer. Her impresario gets violent toward her.

This film is a very simple melodrama with some circus numbers thrown in. It has a clear propagandistic slant, depicting America as a land of bigots and savages, and the USSR as a paradise of tolerance and freedom; it manages to be mendacious about both countries, of course. In the specific case of racial tolerance, it may be right about the USSR, I couldn't tell for sure. Not that it matters much. There was no significant black population there, and such welcoming messages as this one did not prompt all that many blacks to want to live there. But it is a watchable movie.

Rating: 32