Ballet Movies

The Turning Point

The Red Shoes

Bonjour, dear readers and dancers, I hope you’re stretched and ready for another round of hyper-specific cinema. I’ve been needing a meditative movie cleanse since last week’s double dose of disorienting and somewhat disappointing American Absurdism, and ever since I stepped into a pair of crazy-compelling dance movies months ago, I’ve been itching to watch more movies that celebrate this art form. There are, of course, a multitude of dance styles, disciplines, and categories of cutting a rug—tap, jazz, contemporary, hip hop, folk, Irish, ballroom, swing, line, belly, interpretive, modern, bolero, rumba, salsa, merengue, liturgical, lyrical, flamenco, pole, polka, Capoeira, breakdancing—and I could go on. But the style of dance that is closest to my heart, the language of movement and poetry in motion that speaks the most to me, is ballet. Some of you may be thinking, “okay booooooooooring”, and that’s fair. But I find the art of ballet to be breathtaking and fascinating, as well as its rich history and profound effect on pop culture. Ballet has its roots in Italy in France, where it was often conducted as entertainment for royal courts, wedding parties, coronations, and other elaborate spectacles. Much of ballet’s origins are credited to France, but when the practice arrived in Russia in the 1700s during Catherine the Great’s reign, ballet grew exponentially in popularity. Ballet was once just an accompaniment to operas, but it eventually became an art that could be appreciated on its own. Similar to theater performers, the earliest ballerinas were male, but in the mid-1700s women began to adopt the art for themselves, and this marked a shift in the kinds of stories being told in the ballet. Soon, the lead roles and archetypes in ballet epics were predominantly female, and while the institution of ballet still remains an aesthetic and conceptual staple in upper class society, ballet as a whole became more accessible to all. From the age of two til the age of about twelve, I danced ballet at Ballet Austin, and eventually moved to a smaller (less intense) studio when I was in middle school. I remember so vividly getting out of school, rushing home, putting on my tights and leotard while I watched a snippet of Arthur on PBS, then rushing downtown to dance for my (often) very strict teachers. I remember the smell of fresh slippers and the excitement in the wings backstage; the terror of being packed like sardines in audition rooms with only mirrored walls, inches away from the next dancer, unable to make a single mistake for fear of injury or embarrassment. The sweat collecting on my back, the blisters on my toes, the skin of my forehead being stretched back into the tightest, most hair-sprayed bun possible (which I still credit as to why I was one of the few students to remain unscathed in the great lice outbreak of ‘04.) The painstaking precision, perfection, poise; the feeling of finally understanding a move, and the addictive quality of getting it exactly right after practice, practice, practice. It wasn’t until middle school that I was really aware of my growing body, aware of how evolving shoulders and boobs and hips affected ones appearance in a highly-unflattering, flesh-colored leotard. Right as I was coming into my body, I no longer wanted to express myself with it. I loved ballet passionately until I hated it. But it will always have a place in my heart. It seems impossible to this former dancer to not eventually reach a point of physical and mental exhaustion, so I’m immensely impressed by (and a bit frightened of) people who can stick with it. It’s not all cigarettes and eating disorders and rigid schedules, but the cultural idea of ballet—as evidenced by tonight’s films—certainly revolves around the good, the bad, and the ugliest facets of this elegant sport, which, admittedly, do make for some great stories. First I watched a film that my ballet-loving mother has been begging me to watch for years, a film that perfectly embodies the terrifying beauty of ballet—Herbert Ross’ 1977 dance drama The Turning Point. The Turning Point introduces us to DeeDee and Emma (Shirley MacLaine and Anne Bancroft) two middle aged and chicly-dressed women who used to dance ballet together. As the lore is explained throughout the movie, these women were besties back in the day, and both were excellent dancers at a highly-esteemed New York ballet academy. DeeDee falls in love with a fellow dancer, Wayne (Tom Skerritt), and becomes pregnant—effectively ending her days as a career ballerina. Because of this, Emma becomes the most prominent and famous ballerina at the company, while DeeDee and Wayne go off to Oklahoma City to start a family and their own quaint dance academy. Twenty years later, DeeDee and Wayne have three children: an eldest daughter Emilia (Leslie Browne) who shares her mother’s passion for ballet, a middle daughter with no interest in ballet, and a younger son who is ballet-curious. When Emma and the rest of the New York ballet company are on tour in Oklahoma City, DeeDee and Wayne take their whole family to see it, then host an after party at their home for all of their old dance friends. DeeDee is emotional to see Emma and her long lost prancing pals, not just because Shirley MacLaine is the prettiest crier of all time and must be contractually-obligated to cry in every single movie, but because it stirs up a bunch of feelings, and longstanding bitterness. Right before DeeDee got pregnant all those years ago, she was supposed to play the lead in Anna Karenina, a role Emma naturally had to take over—which has been hanging over DeeDee’s head for decades. DeeDee’s daughter Emilia aspires to be a dancer but DeeDee is all too aware of the sacrifices one must make for that life, so when Emilia auditions for the New York ballet company and makes it in, DeeDee (and her ballet-curious son Ethan) go with her to New York for the Summer. Chin raised high and cig in hand, Emma is the oldest and most revered dancer at this company. And despite meaningful love and friendship missing from her life, Emma seems perfectly content with continuing her career, and she soon becomes Emilia’s mentor. Already overcome with nostalgia and longing and questions still lingering from the past, DeeDee is pushed to her limits when she sees her daughter being doted on by her frenemy and being seduced by a Russian hunk by the name of Yuri (Mikhail Baryshnikov) Everything comes to a head when DeeDee confronts Emma with her long-withheld feelings, the two read each other for filth, and Emma throws a drink in DeeDee’s face (a moment that was entirely improvised and no-doubt shocking to the legendary cuntress Shirley MacLaine.) The Turning Point is a masterclass in dancing, writing, costuming, and soap opera-levels of dramatic acting. Part of why I love watching ballet is because it is such an evocative, expressive art, that so much can be said without speaking a single word. And while many words are had in The Turning Point, its dance sequences accomplish the same thing. Ironically, Shirley MacLaine was the dancer of this cast, but never dances in it. And while Anne Bancroft was certainly built like a ballerina, the only active ballet dancers in the film were Leslie Browne and Baryshnikov—who’s heartthrob status reflected America’s obsession with ballet in the 1970s, only rivaled by the grip leg-warmers had on the fashion world in the 1980s. I couldn’t help staring in awe at Baryshnikov’s handsome face and expert-level talent in The Turning Point, and he would continue to captivate audiences into the 90s and early 2000s when he dated Carrie Bradshaw on Sex and the City. My mom prefaced our watch by saying we could skip through the extended dance sequences in this film, but I couldn’t look away from the effortless leaps and pliés and grand jete’s, the soft shades of peach and pinks and salmon they all wore, and with each occurrence of bitingly bitchy unfinished business dialogue from the two leading ladies—I didn’t want to miss a moment of this film. The Turning Point is a perfectly melodramatic yet surprisingly understated tale about the pressures of this art form, the crazy-talented artists who partake in it, and the prickly paths that life leads us on. The idea that one can either only dance ballet OR have a life seems preposterous to me, and yet it is the exact same premise of the next film that I watched: Powell and Pressburger’s 1948 ballet epic The Red Shoes. Like Citizen Kane, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Wizard of Oz, and Casablanca, The Red Shoes is one of those films that directors and filmmakers all over the world cite as their inspiration. It is one of Martin Scorsese’s favorite movies, and he owns more memorabilia from this film than likely any museum, including a pair of the original, titular red shoes. The Red Shoes is based off of a Hans Christian Andersen fairytale, and much like the rest of those fables this, too, ends tragically—but not before dazzling the audience thoroughly. The Red Shoes begins at a ballet performance where the seats are quickly filled with eager art-enjoyers who behave as if they’re about to see The Beatles in 1964. Among them is a music composition student named Julian Craster (Marius Goring), who is anxious to hear his professor’s newest piece, until he begins to recognize the music as a score he wrote himself—now seemingly plagiarized by his professor. Later that night at a post-performance party, the hostess, Lady Neston, requests that the manager of this ballet, Mr. Lermontov (Anton Walbrook), meet her niece and let her dance for him. The ballet manager and company impresario scoffs at this request, stating that he “cannot bear amateurs”, before walking into another room and meeting a gorgeous redhead named Vicky Page (Moira Shearer [who I’m 99% sure inspired the name of Moira Rose in Schittz Creek]) He tells her that Lady Neston wanted someone to dance for us, “but thankfully we were spared that horror.” To which Vicky responds, “Mr. Lermontov, I am that horror.” After a little more convincing, and Lermontov going on a rant about how dance is more than a passion but a religion, he agrees to let Vicky audition for the company, to which she is accepted. Julian Craster, the man who’s music was stolen by his professor, arrives at Mr. Lermontov’s office to report this plagiarism, which somehow results in Mr. Lermontov employing Mr. Craster. With an incredibly talented young dancer and a remarkably fresh composer newly added to his roster, the Ballet Lermontov is more successful than ever—particularly when this trio gets together to produce their newest show: “The Red Shoes”. This tragic fable revolves around a woman who gets a new pair of red shoes to go out dancing, but when she is tired and wants to go home, the shoes will not let her stop. An eerie and apt story for this ambitious ballerina to undertake... Lermontov works Vicky like an animal, never allowing her breaks or even sips of water, as to not risk “messing up her breathing”… He puts her on a strict diet and forces Julian to play the music to the show while she eats so she can never escape her role. The costuming and makeup were already divine, the colors and tones were already blindingly-beautiful, but when the curtain is raised and the show begins, The Red Shoes reaches another level of radiance. This ballet is utterly ridiculous in the best way. The gorgeous and gargantuan hand-painted sets that I come to expect from a Powell and Pressburger affair were rivaled only by the bright tights and tutus and facial expressions that were being exhibited alongside them. I know I’m biased because I love watching ballet, but every performer in this show, particularly Moira Shearer, was so visceral and impossibly impeccable it made my jaw drop. The joy beaming from her when she first puts on the red shoes and the terror that shines from her when she cannot remove them—I felt it all. I couldn’t look away during this performance, I couldn’t blink and miss any of the vibrant colors or emotions or the groundbreaking special effects that made it look like these ballerinas were just floating on air, traveling through different sets and states of mind. It results in one of the trippiest scenes from an old movie I’ve ever seen, every lovely, terrifying, heartbreaking moment was astounding. When the show ends, the Ballet Lermontov and their star performer Vicky are hotter than ever, but this is exactly when the trouble begins. I shan’t give away what happens next, for fear of spoiling its impact—also I’ve written far, far too much about these movies already—but I can’t say enough good things about The Red Shoes. It not only met the hype but exceeded my expectations. Apart from Vicky, none of the ballerinas in The Red Shoes were as precise as the ballerinas in The Turning Point, but both films featured an equal amount of juicy, toxic, ballerina beef—which I am obsessed with apparently. Tonight’s films were en pointe and they only slightly triggered my ballet-related trauma so I consider this a victory. I curtsy to you, dear reader, thank you for letting me ramble and rant and rave about these bold ballets. Bye bye, ballerinas!