The Son of the Sheik

Ahmed is the son of the desert sheik Ahmed Ben Hassan. He falls for Yasmin, a dancing girl who is the public face of her father's gang of swindlers. The two meet in secret until the gang seizes the sheik's son, tortures him and holds him for ransom. When Ahmed gets free, he believes Yasmin was part of it. It is the sequel to The Sheik of 1921 and Rudolph Valentino's last film, with Valentino playing both the father and the son. He died in August 1926 at the age of thirty-one, before the picture went into general release, and his funeral drew crowds America had never seen. Seen now, the colonial desert fantasy belongs entirely to its moment; what Valentino does on screen still holds.