The Last Command
![The Last Command](https://s3.amazonaws.com/criterion-production/films/2b931ae29e86d4ed2063537bf098980c/OKZUvVNJVZ8ObmVB14S6T0rxmoG8CA_large.jpg)
Emil Jannings won the first best actor Academy Award for his performance as a sympathetic tyrant: an exiled Russian general turned Hollywood extra who lands a role playing a version of his former tsarist self, bringing about his emotional downfall. Josef von Sternberg’s The Last Command is a brilliantly realized silent melodrama and a witty send-up of the Hollywood machine, featuring virtuoso cinematography, grandly designed sets and effects, and rousing Russian Revolution sequences. Towering above it all is the passionate, heartbreaking Jannings, whose portrayal of a man losing his grip on reality is one for the history books.
Available In
![The Last Command](https://s3.amazonaws.com/criterion-production/films/2b931ae29e86d4ed2063537bf098980c/OKZUvVNJVZ8ObmVB14S6T0rxmoG8CA_large.jpg)
Cast
- Emil Jannings
- Grand Duke Sergius Alexander
- Evelyn Brent
- Natalie
- William Powell
- The Director
- Jack Raymond
- The Assistant
- Nicholas Soussanin
- The Adjutant
- Michael Visaroff
- The Bodyguard
- Fritz Feld
- A Revolutionist
Credits
- Director
- Josef von Sternberg
- Story by
- Lajos Bíró
- Screenplay by
- John F. Goodrich
- Titles by
- Herman J. Mankiewicz
- Photographed by
- Bert Glennon
- Edited by
- William Shea
A scene from The Last Command
![](https://criterion-production.s3.amazonaws.com/carousel-files/e500e815504fa2994fd175e95e095a80.jpeg)