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The Red Shoes (1948),
Directors: Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger, Not Rated
There Has Never Been A Motion Picture Like...
The Red Shoes
  Starring:
Moira Shearer, Anton Walbrook, Marius Goring, Robert Helpmann,
Léonide Massine, Albert Bassermann, Ludmilla Tchérina, Esmond
Knight, Austin Trevor, Irene Browne, Hay Petrie
DML Rating:
★★★★★★★★★☆
- near perfect
"You cannot have it both
ways. A dancer who relies upon the doubtful comforts of human
love can never be a great dancer. Never." – Boris
Lermontov
Why watch this? It
really is a work of dance art that overwhelms the senses.
Plot Summary:
In South France, a driven young ballerina must choose between
her intense ambition to become a great dancer and the love of a
composer who wants her to lead a more balanced life. Her
demanding instructor, obsessed with the belief that a dancer can
have no other life than art, pushes her to an emotional breaking
point. This psychological conflict unfolds as she dances the
lead in a new ballet production called "The Red Shoes."
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Dad's Preview:
Often called the "Best Dance Movie Ever", this allegorical tale
follows a dance company as it performs a ballet rendition of
Hans Christian Anderson's fairy tale,
The Red Shoes. At the plot's center is the price paid
for perfection, and how a determined young girl is pulled
between a demanding, possessive impresario, and her unexpected
love for a budding young composer. The brilliance here is that
both the inspiring fairy tale and the film's plot follow similar
paths, both heading toward the same fates. Equally mesmerizing
is the film's performance of the title ballet, in which the
stage is magically transformed into a fantastical dream-vision,
mirroring our heroine's complex emotions, fears and desires.
This cautionary story has a lot to offer aside from it's amazing
Technicolor presentation: incredible dance sequences,
over-the-top obsessions, and an ending that made me gasp out
loud.
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Powell and
Pressburger, The Archers; General Film
Distributors |
