The red shoes (1948)

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Movie
German title The red shoes
Original title The Red Shoes
Country of production Great Britain
original language English
Publishing year 1948
length 133 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Michael Powell
Emeric Pressburger
script Michael Powell
Emeric Pressburger
production Michael Powell
Emeric Pressburger
music Brian Easdale
camera Jack Cardiff
cut Reginald Mills
occupation
synchronization

The Red Shoes is a British ballet film with Adolf Wohlbrück and Moira Shearer in the leading roles, which was made under the direction of the filmmaker duo Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger .

action

The film begins with a performance of the Lermontov ballet in the Royal Opera House , at which the young dancer Victoria "Vicki" Page is also present in the audience and is impressed. After the performance, Vicki's aunt will be holding a party at which Boris Lermontov, the actually shy and perfectionist manager of the ballet, will be present. Lermontov invites them to a rehearsal at his ballet. A little later, Lermontov receives a visit from the young music student Julian Craster, who is indignant about his professor, who was responsible for the music at Lermontov's performance: the professor had plagiarized his compositions . Lermontov lets Craster play the piano for himself and believes him, he hires him as a répétiteur and assistant to the musical director Livy. The set designer Sergei Ratov, the choreographer Grischa Ljubov and the main dancers Ivan and Irina are also important members of the ballet.

Victoria doesn't seem to stand out from the ensemble at first, but Lermontov hires her when he sees her dancing in another, less elaborate production of Swan Lake . She is allowed to travel to Paris and Monte Carlo with the ensemble . When the previous main dancer Irina marries and leaves the ballet, Lermontov - who only lives for the ballet - acknowledges with contempt and disappointment. In search of a new star, Lermontov recognizes Vicki's potential and asks her to play the title role of a new ballet: The Red Shoes was composed by Julian and is based on the fairy tale of the same name by Hans Christian Andersen , in which a girl through her red shoes can't stop dancing and eventually dies. Vicki and Julian fall in love during rehearsals for the new piece. The performance turns out to be a success, but Lermontov forbids the liaison between the dancer and the musician because love would make them no longer focus on their art. Julian refuses and leaves the ballet, Vicki follows him and marries him.

About a year later, Victoria travels to Monte Carlo, where her red shoes, which the angry Lermontov had taken after she left the repertoire, happen to be danced again. When she is persuaded by Lermontov to return and is preparing for the first performance, Julian Craster shows up and demands that she leave the ballet and follow him. Vicki is torn and desperate between the love for Julian and the love for ballet. She puts on the red shoes, which seem to move magically by themselves and pull them towards Julian - after all, she throws herself from a balcony in front of a train, which Julian has to observe at the train station. He rushes over and she dies in his arms. With her last words she asked Julian to take off her red shoes. At the performance of The Red Shoes , which takes place despite her death and is announced by a shaken-looking Lermontov, a spotlight points to the empty space that it should occupy.

Production history

The beginnings of the film project can be traced back to around 1934 to the producer Alexander Korda , who wanted his future wife Merle Oberon to play in a ballet film. Emeric Pressburger worked on the script that was about the changeable life of the ballet legend Vaslav Nijinsky . Under the director Ludwig Berger , some test recordings with ballet dancers were made, but the project did not really make progress and with the beginning of the Second World War it was no longer considered up-to-date. After the end of the World War, Pressburger and Michael Powell, with whom he had in the meantime formed a directing duo, looked for a film that would offer the population a little escapism in the immediate post-war period . Powell and Pressburger bought the script that Korda had put aside, revised it and produced it themselves.

The 21-year-old leading actress Moira Shearer had never worked as an actress before, only as a ballet dancer - it was her film debut. At that time, she was considered a great, but still largely unknown, talent at Sadler's Wells in London. Michael Powell really wanted to win her for the lead role and assumed that she would immediately accept enthusiastically. Shearer wanted to become famous as a ballet dancer, not as an actress, and therefore saw the film project as a detour for her career. She only accepted the role at the urging of her ballet director Ninette de Valois and her promise that she could return to Sadler's Wells immediately after filming ended. As she was later associated almost exclusively with her role in Die Rote Schuhe , her feelings for the film remained ambivalent over the next few decades. Nevertheless, she later played with Hoffmann's Tales and Eyes of Fear in two other Michael Powell films.

synchronization

The German dubbed version was created in 1948 in the Eagle-Lion dubbing studio in Hamburg after dubbing and dubbing by CW Burg .

role actor German Dubbing voice
Victoria "Vicki" Page Moira Shearer Gisela Hoeter
Boris Lermontov Adolf Wohlbrück Ernst Fritz Fürbringer
Julian Craster Marius Goring Otto Arneth
Grisha Ljubov Léonide Massine Axel Schacht
Ivan Boleslawsky Robert Helpmann Harald Wolff
Irina Boronskaya Ludmilla Tchérina Til Klokow
Sergei Ratov Albert Bassermann Heinz Burkhardt
Livingston "Livy" Montague Esmond Knight Curt Ackermann
Professor Palmer Austin Trevor Harald Mannl
Lady Neston, Vicki's aunt Irene Browne Eva Eras

Reviews

"The film lives less from its rather banal story than from its 'show' elements: the music of Brian Easdale , excellently interpreted by Thomas Beecham , the colorful equipment of Hein Heckroth and above all the choreography of Robert Helpmann ."

- Reclam's film guide

"A masterpiece of ballet film that makes the best possible use of all cinematic design options - camera, montage, colors in advance."

- Lexicon of international film

“The strength of this film, which tells a story from the ballet artist's milieu, is not in the foreground of the action, it is based on the overwhelming intoxication of colors and the transparency of the enjoyment of art presented with purely visual means. The climax of this film, which is excellent in camera work, editing technology and music, is the performance of the ballet Die Rote Schuhe .

- Protestant film observer

" The Red Shoes , released in 1948, is perhaps the definitive ballet movie."

- Mark Duguid : BFI screenonline

“Andersen's theme actually defines the content of the film, allegorically, so to speak. It has been varied from timelessness to contemporary, from fairy tale magic to psychological. "

- The mirror

Reception in art

Based on the film, a musical of the same name by Jule Styne was created , which premiered at the Gershwin Theater on New York's Broadway on December 16, 1993. At that time, Steve Barton played the main role of the ballet impresario Boris Lermontov. Margaret Illmann was the dance star of this piece in the role of Victoria Page. Lar Lubovitch received the Astaire Award from the Theater Development Fund for choreographing the dance sequences in the show . After 51 previews, the musical was only played five times and then canceled.

Also in 1993 Kate Bush released her film inspired album The Red Shoes with a theme song of the same name.

Awards

The British Film Institute voted The Red Shoes the 9th best British films of all time in 1999 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Essay: The Red Shoes - Dancing for Your Life , David Ehrenstein, July 20, 2010, accessed February 13, 2019
  2. ↑ Documentary: A Profile of 'The Red Shoes' (2000), author: David Lemon
  3. ↑ John Gruen: Moira Shearer: Still Chased by 'Red Shoes' . In: The New York Times . January 10, 1988, ISSN  0362-4331 ( nytimes.com [accessed February 13, 2019]).
  4. ↑ Documentary: A Profile of 'The Red Shoes' (2000), author: David Lemon
  5. ↑ The red shoes at the German Synchronous Database
  6. ^ Reclam's film guide . 2nd edition 1973, ISBN 3-15-010205-7
  7. ^ The red shoes in the lexicon of international filmsTemplate: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used
  8. ↑ Evangelical Press Association Munich, Review No. 1/1949
  9. ↑ Mark Duguid: Red Shoes, The (1948) - A young ballet dancer is torn beetween love and career. BFI screenonline (English)
  10. ↑ Miss Shearer says no twice - Danced out of love and life . In: Der Spiegel . No. 32 , 1948 ( online ).
  11. ^ NY Times: The Red Shoes . In: NY Times . Retrieved December 20, 2008.