Idols and Idolatry: Greta Garbo and Ramón Novarro in Mata Hari (1931)

Abstract

In this chapter begins by examining mythological constructions of Greta Garbo’s image in the early 1930s, including references to her as a Sphinx or Siren, and how receptions of her voice in film fan magazines followed similarly coded responses. It then explores the pairing of this ‘Stockholm Venus’ with that of Ramón Novarro, the ‘Greek god from Mexico’, in their respective publicity before focusing on a case study of Mata Hari (George Fitzmaurice, 1931). Here, the stars appear as the eponymous exotic dancer and German spy, and her lover, Lt. Alexis Rosanoff of the Russian Air Force. The film presents a highly reflexive articulation of the discourse of ‘divinised’ stardom. Sex, religion, idolatry and stardom are bound together in a cinematographic interrogation of the aura of icons—particularly in the film’s striking ‘icon light’ sequence, and their long history in religious art, Christian and pagan.