The Red Shoes

Release Year: 1948

Director: Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger

Review: Passion is everything.  We live for passions, we die for passions, we are consumed by passions.  They can both be a fulfilling motivator or an obsessive nuisance.  When two passions come to a head, one must over take the other.  'The Red Shoes' examines this concept much fuller and more eloquently then I could ever hope to express here.  Love triangles are messy enough, but when a triad of passions are also interwoven it adds another dimension to the tension.  A young dancer, Vicky(Moira Shearer), is obsessed with dance and is just breaking through into a major ballet company headed by Boris Lermontov(Anton Walbrook).  Also joining the company is Julian(Marius Goring), a gifted musician who is will be the ballets conductor.  Each is supremely gifted at what they do, and as a trio they have the potential to bring dance to new heights and put on the best ballet productions the world has ever seen.  Lermontov has one rule: his dancers can have only one love, and that is dance.  When Vicky and Julian fall in love all the passions collide, and something has to give.

I must confess, I'm not one who loves dance.  I can appreciate that it's art, but its not something which has ever moved me.  'The Red Shoes' is a dance film through and through.  While I did get a bit restless during the 17 minute dance sequence in the middle of the film, for the most part the dancing is handled immaculately.  The emotions and joy for dance by the people partaking in it are what is important and this comes through in force.  Powell and Pressburger are master filmmakers who know they can't simply present a ballet as is and get the full emotional effect.  They infuse it with life, elaborate it, and make it more than simple choreography.  Even in the extended dance scene, they intertwine the ballet with fantasy elements.  It's not about representing reality, its about invoking feelings.  This is cinema.

As beautiful a film it is with it's vibrant Technicolor pallet, and as ingeniously as dance is handled, without them, this is still a wonderful movie.  The way love is and passion are melded together and the sheer torture choosing between the two is enthralling.  The title is derived from the ballet which is performed by Vicky, and is a clear reflection of Vicky's own life.  In the ballet, a girl puts on a pair of red shoes and is compelled to dance.  Only she can't stop dancing, it consumes her and eventual kills her.  The arc for Vicky is known from the start, and yet the way in which the story unfolds within these bounds is what is captivating.

All of the acting in the film is incredible.  As good as all the actors are, Anton Walbrook steals the show.  In a way his character Lermontov is the most complex.  He is a well respected ballet producer.  Dancers desperately fight for his attention for a chance to dance his shows.  For most this success would be enough, he has reached the height of his profession.  But its not enough.  He is obsessed with putting on better and better shows.  He lives to create great ballet, and has given up everything for this passion.  He has given up romantic love to further his work, and expects everyone else to do the same.  But at the same time there is more, almost a regret.  It appears that he is in love with Vicky himself.  He is torn up inside with his feelings and he cowardly retreats back to his performance.  It's what he knows, its what is safe, its what he can control.  Walbrook somehow manages to express these intense emotions with a subtlety and poise that is baffling.  He delivers lines with such conviction that lines fall like steaks being driven into your chest.  It's his performance which resonates through you well after the film has ended.

In many ways it's frustrating watching what happens to Vicky, at least for a romantic.  There is nothing greater than love.  Nothing could possibly matter more.  Its what we've learned from countless romance movies.  Here the same trajectory is taken, only there is a bump in the road.  Vicky loves Julius, but she needs more.  It's not simply that she'd like to dance, she needs to dance.  It's heartbreaking to see her battle between the man she loves and the thing in life which makes her life living.  Heartbreaking, but also captivating and moving.  It's simply a wonderful film.
Rating: 4.5/5