The Red Shoes
| Les chaussons rouges | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Amalia Blumenthal |
| Starring |
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Production company | |
| Distributed by | |
Release date | 1 December 1958 |
Running time | 150 minutes |
| Country | Gylias |
| Languages | |
| Budget | Ŧ600 million |
| Box office | Ŧ1,5 billion |
The Red Shoes (French: Les chaussons rouges) is a 1958 Gylian film, directed by Amalia Blumenthal and starring Ludmila Canaşvili. It portrays a ballet company rehearsing and performing a ballet loosely based on the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale.
The film was one of the first projects of the Gylian National Film Institute, which produced and co-distributed it. Production went smoothly, but the ambitious vision of Amalia caused shooting to overrun its schedule.
Upon release, The Red Shoes received critical acclaim, and was a financial success. It is regarded as a classic of Gylian cinema and one of the greatest films about ballet, particularly for its praised centrepiece sequence. It was influential on Gylian cinema, including musical films such as A Hard Day's Night, art films, and films that imitated its fusion of realism and fantasy.
Plot
An unnamed ballet company is touring Gylias. As the film opens, it is staging an open-air performance of Swan Lake in an Arsad village. The performance earns them a standing ovation. Afterwards, they take part in a departure ceremony, and leave for Peisir.
The company meets with music student Esan, who proposes a ballet based on "The Red Shoes". They agree to the project. Esan begins writing the full score. Meanwhile, the company's tour continues. It is shown performing Swan Lake and an original ballet named Heart of Fire in Nikopolis and Argyrokastron.
The completed score for The Ballet of the Red Shoes arrives, and the company begins rehearsals. Mila, the première danseuse, accepts a relegation to sujet, as one of her colleagues is better suited to the lead role. To alleviate boredom during journeys, she flirts with one of the crew members, culminating in a one-night stand.
The company joins the National Ballet Company of Gylias for a series of performances in Tomes and Nauras, then proceeds west. The National Ballet Company observes rehearsals, and expresses interest in adding The Ballet of the Red Shoes to its repertoire. Mila befriends Évelyne, one of the National Ballet Company's stars. The two jokingly agree that if either of them takes a break from their company, the other should be their understudy.
The Ballet of the Red Shoes premieres in Etra, to resounding success. The company travels north for its next few performances, including a visit to Molise. Mila meets Elfriþ, and the two fall in love.
Some time later, the company performs The Ballet of the Red Shoes in Mişeyáke, and earns a standing ovation. Esan is asked about the next project, and replies, "I don't know yet." Mila temporarily leaves the company, and recommends Évelyne replace her until she returns. The company leaves Mişeyáke by train for their next destination. The film ends with Mila bidding them farewell from the platform, happy at their success yet overcome with emotion.
Cast
- Ludmila Canaşvili as Mila
- Osid Þerar as Esan
- Margot Fontaine as Évelyne
- Şaeti Lanséy as Elfriþ
Production
A screenplay for the film had already been written in the Free Territories, and was purchased by the Gylian National Film Institute soon after its creation. The project enjoyed the support of culture minister Eoni Nalion and Arts Council chair Tomoko Tōsaka, who felt it would be a good showcase for Gylian cinema after the end of the Liberation War.
Amalia Blumenthal was hired to direct the film. She made some important changes in pre-production. These had the effect of eliminating or significantly downplaying much of the original story, to the displeasure of the screenwriter. Due to the centrality of ballet to the plot, it was decided to hire dancers who could act. Most of the cast were dancers on loan from the National Ballet Company of Gylias. As a humorous touch, the dancer characters were named after their actors. Similarly, a running joke was made about the name of the ballet company, which is not mentioned in the film.
The casting of the main character was crucial. Amalia described her as "an impressive young dancer, a beauty, a good-humoured, lazy slut, destined to marry a rich and easy-going spouse, and live a charmed life." After seeing the film Une revenant, Amalia decided that Ludmila Canaşvili was perfect for the role, and cast her as the lead. No other actors were considered.
Filming began on 5 May 1958. On the first day of the shoot, Amalia told the cast and crew: "We'll be doing things that haven't been done before, we'll have to work very hard—but I know it's going to be worth it." Filming proceeded smoothly, with the cast and crew having a "happy time" on set.
The production was attentive to the cast, providing them with long breaks and stools to sit down in between filming the ballet sequences. Much of the film was shot on location. Some stage and orchestra pit scenes were filmed in a studio in Etra, on specially constructed sets.
Amalia's ambitious vision caused the film to overrun its planned shoot. The production was faced with rationing during the National Obligation period. The budget is officially estimated at Ŧ600 million, but relatively little of it was in þalers, with the rest being covered by complementary currencies. Margot Fontaine, who appears in a smaller role as Évelyne, recalled much payment in kind and barter taking place on the set.
Amalia and Ludmila enjoyed a close collaboration during filming. According to one biographer: "Amalia assumed the task of squeezing all of Ludmila's brilliance onto film, and Ludmila did what Amalia asked dutifully." The two worked closely to perfect Mila's characterisation, which Amalia described: "Mila's never done a day's hard work in her life, but she's well-behaved, respectful, and charming. She's never talked down to anyone, or really known hardship. We had to get the combination right, so the audience would like Mila and envy her bed of roses slightly."
The central The Ballet of the Red Shoes sequence was filmed last and took nearly 6 weeks. The sequence proved difficult for experienced dancers, used to performing live ballet. Amalia was aware of the frustration of preparing hours to shoot moments that lasted as little as a few seconds, and intentionally slowed down production and increased breaks to accommodate them.
The score was performed by the Arxaþ Regional Orchestra. The editor's cut lasted nearly 4 hours. The producers recommended deleting some of the non-ballet sequences to condense the plot, resulting in a final cut of 2 hours and a half.
Release
The Red Shoes premiered on 1 December 1958. It received positive reviews in the media. The National Record hailed it as an "extreme pleasure" and "brilliantly experimental". The Social Times highlighted the hallucinatory quality of the climactic ballet sequence, describing it as "the nearest thing to a dope-addict's dream". The Morning Post praised Ludmila's acting, describing her as "a throbbing, pulsating dynamo" in the ballet sequences and "the heart of the film" elsewhere.
Co-distributed by the GNFI and various distributors within the NCC, the film was a financial success. It recouped its budget and earned a modest profit. It had more admissions than the box office indicates, as the GNFI sponsored train and open-air showings of the film in rural areas of Gylias.
The film earned a somewhat mixed reception abroad, with more conservative dance critics lambasting the impressionistic touches of the climactic ballet sequence. Thus, while it was essentially a mainstream release in Gylias, it was relegated to the arthouse circuit in other countries.
It was digitally restored and released on Laserdisc, DVD, and Proton in the 1990s.
Legacy
Today, The Red Shoes is considered a classic of Gylian cinema, and one of Amalia's best films. Retrospectives published on its 40th and 50th anniversary have highlighted the use of colour and the marriage of cinéma vérité and avant-garde techniques, making it a notable example of "applied avant-garde". Radix wrote of Amalia's unconventional approach of centring the film on Mila although she is not the lead of the ballet, giving it a distinctive and less "heroic" viewpoint.
Much of the film is presented in Amalia's stark, Dziga Vertov-inspired style, with long takes, an emphasis on capturing authentic moments, and an unvarnished look at the rigours of touring. The early ballet sequences feature similarly functional camerawork, and the urban scenes depict the ongoing reconstruction and rationing of the National Obligation period. As a result, the centrepiece The Ballet of the Red Shoes sequence, lasting nearly 20 minutes, provides a more dramatic climax, with lavish staging, impressionistic touches, dynamic camerawork, and a variety of editing techniques and special effects.
As one of the GNFI's first successful productions, commentators have described the film as a "momentous debut". Historian Herta Schwamen notes that it had a "rousing" effect on audiences after the Liberation War.
The Red Shoes was influential on subsequent Gylian musical films. Lia Fyresi and the Beaties drew on its combination of cinéma vérité presentation and surreal elements for A Hard Day's Night (1964), while the band's later Magical Mystery Tour (1967) uses a similar combination with greater emphasis on psychedelia. The emphasis on the tedious aspects of the creative process, with the realism of rehearsals preparing the audience for the climactic performance, became standard for Gylian films dealing with similar artistic pursuits. The film also influenced various art films, both at home and abroad.
The film established the character type that defined Ludmila's screen presence for the rest of her career: the agreeably pampered aristocrat who is sensitive and helpful to others despite "never having worked a day in her life", with humour coming from a mixture of her inexperience at mundane matters and her ability to charm other characters into treating her sympathetically. The cream-coloured Levystile suit and black hat she wore in much of the film became a popular clothing item, often nicknamed the "Mila suit". She embraced the association and frequently wore it in public afterwards, particularly during her 1967 presidential campaign.