Shortened version of the live registration of ‘The Siren of the Tropics’ (‘La Sirène des Tropiques, FR 1927) featuring Josephine Baker. Performed December 23rd, 2012, EYE Filminstitute Netherlands, Amsterdam
Music written by Michiel Münninghoff (www.michielmunninghoff.com)
La Sirène des Tropiques (also known as Siren of the Tropics) is a historic 1927 French silent film directed by Henri Étiévant and Mario Nalpas. The film is most notable for starring the legendary Josephine Baker in her feature-length film debut, making her the first Black woman to headline a major studio production. While the narrative itself is a messy, preposterous melodrama, the movie remains an essential watch entirely because of Baker’s uncontained, magnetic screen presence.
The Plot: A Preposterous Silent Melodrama
The narrative begins in Paris, where the ruthless Marquis Sévéro plots to divorce his wife to marry his own goddaughter, Denise. However, Denise is in love with a poor engineer, André Berval (played by Pierre Batcheff). To eliminate his rival, the Marquis sends André to manage a mineral mine in the Antilles, leaving secret instructions for his henchman, Alvarez, to ensure André never returns.
Once in the tropics, André saves a wild, carefree local woman named Papitou (Josephine Baker) from Alvarez’s aggressive advances. Papitou immediately falls deeply in love with her dashing savior. When André eventually returns to France, a heartbroken Papitou stows away on a ship to follow him. Through a chaotic series of events, she transforms from an impoverished islander into the glittering toast of the Paris music-hall scene, ultimately making a self-sacrificing choice to secure André’s happiness.
The Highlight: Josephine Baker’s Kinetic Artistry
The script of La Sirène des Tropiques is undoubtedly a structural mess, awkwardly shifting from dark colonial melodrama to jarring slapstick comedy. Yet, the directors clearly realized what an extraordinary force they had in Baker, frequently shifting the focus of the lens just to let her command the screen.
- Electric Presence: Baker doesn’t merely act; she practically explodes off the screen with vigor, passion, and an athletic, comedic energy.
- The Dawn of an Icon: Filmed less than three years into her European stardom, the movie serves as a pristine time capsule of her early, uninhibited performance style.
- Behind the Scenes Trivia: A young Luis Buñuel served as an assistant director on the film, adding an extra layer of film-history pedigree.
The Critical Flaws: Racist Tropes and Perfunctory Editing
While Baker’s performance is delightful, modern viewers must approach the film with context. The story is heavily mired in the “racist primitivism” tropes common in 1920s European media.
The film frames Papitou’s character through a lens of exoticized hyper-sexualization and childlike wildness, engineered explicitly to invent excuses for casual nudity—including a famous bathtub scene. Furthermore, because it is a silent film, Baker is stripped of her vocal talents, and modern prints often feature perfunctory, poorly synchronized musical scores that struggle to keep up with her rapid, high-tempo jazz choreography.