Just perfect...

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

The movie is made so realistic it has a lot of that WoW feeling at the right moments and never tooo over the top. the suspense is done so well and the emotion is felt. Very well put together with the music and all.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

This film is not your typical 5/10 film. It has all the hallmarks of a well-made MGM production of its era, including a good cast performing their roles quite well and believably, great cinematography, good art and costume design etc. However, you just can't get past the spectacle of Myrna Loy's character falling for a man who is at least her stalker and most probably her rapist.The opening scene is humorous, with amorous Jamil (Ramon Navarro) talking to lady after lady on the train leaving Cairo telling each that she is the only one for him and that parting is heartbreaking. He gives each a piece of jewelry that is supposedly a priceless heirloom. After leaving the train he reaches into his pocket and reveals that he has a handful of such priceless jewelry - they are in fact cheap trinkets, which is precisely how he sees his western conquests, now on their way back to the west with smiles on their faces. So far, so good - Jamil is a playboy, probably just taking advantage of silly women who did give themselves willingly even if under false and, quite frankly, obvious pretenses, and the audience should be able to live with that.Enter Diana Standing (Myrna Loy) arriving in Cairo from the west to marry her fiancé (Reginald Denny), who is unfortunately joined at the hip with a very critical and talkie mother. Jamil spots her and decides she is the one for him. Unfortunately, Diana isn't given the option of saying no to Jamil's dishonest sales pitch, which she does. He abducts her from her caravan, takes her out into the desert, and besides continually pitching woo he uses methods that are tried and true means of breaking down prisoners of war.Diana's fiancé and company finally catch up to her, Jamil escapes, and Diana goes back to civilization to do what she came to do originally - marry the rather dull guy with the unhealthy mommy attachment. Now I can see the ordeal and the distance causing her to change her mind about her wedding, but the final scene is just too much. Jamil appears on her balcony, serenades her, and she not only doesn't turn him into the authorities, she abandons her wedding and goes with him enthusiastically. Her final line - she tells Jamil that her mother was Egyptian. Is that supposed to be some kind of excuse, like a purebred Western girl would never succumb to this treatment but an Egyptian one would? I normally don't write reviews that basically outline the whole plot, and I have left enough details out that you should still find it interesting should you plan to watch it, but the outcome and thus the message of the film is what undoes it to begin with. It's an interesting artifact of the precode era, and I've always enjoyed Myrna Loy and her films, but this is just too much to take.

I think the only saving grace for this film is that is when it was made...1933. Basically you get a suave young lady coming to Cairo to marry her husband. She seems to love him enough then a ruthless womanizer who happens to be a guide/thief in Cairo continually professes his love for her but she resists.They let you know early on that he's a inveterate womanizer but by the end the Myrna Loy character falls in love with him. I mean after he lies to her consistently and she knows it, constantly undermining things between her and her husband, and she knows it...constantly kissing her and she doesn't expect or want it...then the peak of it all, he kidnaps her and forces marriage from her from his tribe. She says yes then turns the tables on him at the ceremony. She gets to leave his ways and she then informs the Egyptian authorities who then set out to catch him (Of course they don't).After all this you already know the ending. There's 2 to 3 minutes left and she finally gets alone in her room ready to get married to her future husband and guess who arrives? You got it, Mr. Charm himself. We then proceed to see them floating down the Nile lying in each others arms.I can only think of this film as offensive to women, in 1 way, is this character so weak minded that she would leave her future husband she loves for a guy who does everything he does to her in the way of lying, cheating and kidnapping and then she decides.."Oh well, I'll go with him cause now I love him."? It's just ridiculous. I can see why this one isn't very popular. It's a dud.If you wanna see where Myrna Loy starts to shine, fast forward a year and start on the "Thin Man" movies. They're a class unto themselves.

I loved this pre-code romance with Ramon Novarro and Myrna Loy as it hearkened back to the days of similar stories such as Valentino's Sheik movies.Ramon has never been sexier than as the Egyptian prince who's moonlighting as something of a cad and a gigolo, but who really only has eyes for Myrna! And Myrna has never looked lovelier than as the high class American who is initially repelled by The Barbarian who abducts her. It's no wonder that she changes her mind in the end when you get a load of her future mother-in-law! The only problem that I had with the story was that the prince abducts Myrna's character which involves her at first being taken against her will, and the trek through the desert seemed to go on forever! This is a finely acted movie with great production values, including gorgeous sets and excellent secondary performances by Reginald Denny as Myrna's fiancé and Louise Hale as Myrna's no nonsense companion! Her tart tongued barbs steal every scene she's in! Ramon has a soft, melodious voice perfectly suited for sound and he gets to sing in several languages! Also look for Myrna in a bathing scene that could only have been done pre-code! Wonderful, escapist pre-code fare!

Kidnapped in the Egyptian desert, a beautiful American finds herself alternately loving & loathing THE BARBARIAN who abducted her.Taken solely as romantic adventure, this lavish little MGM film has much to offer, including good acting & fine production values. Considered only from the standpoint of the plot, the story is ludicrous, what with a heroine suffering histrionics among the sand dunes & a hero who is a completely unprincipled cad.Ramon Novarro does well in the title role, a reprise of his silent film THE ARAB (1924). MGM's Mexican star adds yet another ethnic stripe to his thespian escutcheon, this time portraying an Egyptian prince. Looking a little like a Valentino clone, he gets to sing & act in a variety of languages. Myrna Loy, who only gets billing below the title, is excellent as the Englishwoman caught-up in the allures & entrapments of the Nile Desert. After paying her dues in roles like this, she would very soon become a major Hollywood movie star.In the very able supporting cast Reginald Denny plays Loy's stuffy fiancé; Edward Arnold is an unctuous pasha; Hedda Hopper appears briefly as an American tourist very pleased with Novarro's attentions. Wonderful old Sir C. Aubrey Smith is well cast as Loy's eccentric uncle and elderly, tart-tongued Louise Closser Hale steals every scene she's in as Loy's peppery companion.This film is definitely pre-Production Code vintage, a fact made plainly obvious by Loy's lounge-in-the-tub scene. Considered rationally, many of THE BARBARIAN's implications are rather disturbing. That Loy could only be happy with the man who has humiliated, beaten, abused & raped her are decidedly unwholesome ideas to come from the pen of screenwriter - and liberated woman - Anita Loos.Novarro sings 'Love Songs of the Nile' quite well, but interminably. If it sounds suspiciously like his previous 'Pagan Love Song' hit, it may be because the two songs share the same composers, Nacio Herb Brown & Arthur Freed.