50 Years After, THE RED SHOES Dance On and On - motion picture - Abstract

Dance Magazine, Dec, 1998 by Doris Perlman

From a dance perspective, it must be said that the level of ballet technique in the film is not up to current standards. Turnout is not sufficient, pointe work is sometimes mushy, and beats frequently lack clarity. What the dancers do demonstrate, though, is a wealth of character and personality often missing today. From Mexico, another dancer writes: "Even if the dancing is not brilliant and at times turned in even, how many times do we all see brilliant technique and no artistry nowadays?" She also mentions that a friend of hers is planning a flamenco version of the story.

The passage of time has caused many admirers to rethink the film's relationships more fully in light of the women's movement of recent decades. The fact that Vicky's life was totally controlled by men--that she was definitely not the master of her fate--has more resonance today than it did in 1948, when women had been forced back into the kitchen after World War II in spite of having proved themselves fully capable of dealing with life and careers on their own in factories, in business, and in the armed services. And of course, the problem has not disappeared; it has actually become more visible.

Although a gifted woman, Vicky is still subjected to such egocentric types as Ljubov, the ballet master and choreographer portrayed by Massine, and, above all, to the Diaghilevesque impresario, Boris Lermontov, perfectly embodied by Anton Walbrook. Rather early in the film, Lermontov's attitude toward a woman who has a life outside dance is established by his automatic assumption that when Boronskaja (Ludmilla Tcherina) gets married, she will leave the ballet.

Vicky at first endures few hardships. She appears to come from an affluent and aristocratic background and obviously does not have to earn her own living, except by choice. She is already dancing principal roles with a small company (the real Ballet Rambert at its Mercury Theatre with Marie Rambert herself watching). She wears designer clothes and is feted by her aunt, Lady Neston (Irene Browne), at a lavish London party, where the aunt hopes that Lermontov will see Vicky dance. After her marriage to the composer, Julian (Marius Goring), who is not presented as independently wealthy, the couple live in an apparently spacious flat that no young composer could possibly afford on his own (and is much bigger than almost any London flat, even today). Our heroine's path to a starting career in ballet is made unbelievably smooth. This may be another factor that attracted impressionable young women to a life in ballet. They would not only dance and be loved and admired as Vicky was, but they would also live very well.

I was always under the impression that Vicky did not purposely leap to her death, but that, hastily pursuing Julian, in her confusion and despair she overshot the balcony above the Monte Carlo railroad tracks and went over. However, others have said that they thought she was definitely a suicide. But lately, reading more recent commentaries on the film, I find that the consensus seems to be that Vicky's death is ambiguously presented and that the filmmakers apparently wanted it that way. In any case, the art-versus-personal-happiness conflict is fatal, and even today there is great debate over whether or not a woman can indeed "have it all." Today people might find the seemingly mild-mannered Julian as much of a villain as the domineering Lermontov. These characters, poor dears, were products of their time and culture.