Thieves

Summary

“Thieves” (2023) is a playful, revisionist period drama set behind the scenes of the production of “The Thief of Bagdad.” The film imagines Indian actor Sabu and Chinese American star Anna May Wong crossing paths during the making of Michael Powell’s lavish adventure, and then quietly challenging the director and his crew from within the machinery of the production. What begins as an encounter shaped by the unequal power dynamics of the studio system develops into a sly act of resistance, as the performers recognize how readily the industry borrows from other cultures while limiting the agency of the people asked to embody them. Sabu is presented as both a celebrated screen presence and a young performer navigating the demands placed on him by a British film industry eager to turn him into an exotic spectacle. Wong, meanwhile, brings the experience of an accomplished actress whose talent has never protected her from Hollywood’s racial barriers or from being denied roles that should have been hers. Their contrasting careers and shared understanding of exploitation give the film its emotional center, while Powell and the largely male production team represent the authority controlling what—and whose—stories reach the screen. Blending historical figures with imaginative fiction, “Thieves” is less interested in recreating a famous film than in questioning who gets to create cinematic fantasies and who gets used by them. Its central themes include cultural appropriation, racism in the studio era, the erasure of Asian performers, and the possibility of reclaiming power through collaboration and subversion. The result is a compact, pointed film-within-a-film that treats movie history as something that can be reexamined, challenged, and rewritten.