*****

The Chaperone-sp

Elizabeth McGovern not only played the role of the chaperone in this movie but she actually chaperoned this film project to fruition after reading the book by Laura Moriarity showing it to Julian Fellowes and Michael Engler who were the writer and director of Downton Abbey and who then took on these roles with this movie.

The story opens in 1922 in Wichita, Kansas, where a talented teenage dancer (Haley Lu Richardson) from a well to do family has the opportunity to go to New York City and study with a prestigious dance school for a few months. Her family requires that a chaperone should accompany her and a neighbor, Mrs. Norma Carlisle (Elizabeth McGovern), is ready to take a break from her husband and volunteers for the job.

A cross country train trip sets the mood for their exciting time in New York City where well-dressed people parade in midtown Manhattan, the Prohibition laws are disregarded behind closed doors at various clubs and romance appears in unexpected places. In addition to being a delightful view of New York City about 100 years ago, the story reflects meaningful psychological issues that both the chaperone and her charge have to confront. Surprises, along with some in depth insight into the two main characters all add up to an excellent movie. (2019)

Your comments on this review or the movie are always welcome in the section below

***

Center Stage-nf

In addition to now being a TV network, NetFlix still offers subscribers the ability to reach into the past and request a DVD of a movie or an online play which we may have missed when it came out, or is about a subject that has great appeal to us. SB has always been a lover of ballet and all dance, so she pulled the trigger on this one. We both were not disappointed with this 16-year old film about the audition process to be chosen as a dancer to a topnotch ballet company. The setting is New York City, and any New Yorker will immediately recognize the streets surrounding Lincoln Center, where the American Ballet Theatre has its home.

Ballet stars start at a young age and most of the young faces in this film may not be out of their late teens. The storyline shows each aspiring dancer, male and female, having their own personality and their individual story. Some of the conflicts may be predictable and familiar, but they held our interest and drew us closer to the characters. However, the star of this film was the great dancing of this ensemble and the outstanding choreography.

While we didn’t recognize any of the cast, we suspect that many have gone on to great careers in professional dancing around the country. One outstanding male dancer, who is well-known at the time the movie was made, was Ethan Stiefel. Also, Zoe Saldana who played a rebellious young dancer, became a well-known actress who starred in two subsequent Star Wars movies as well as other big hits. Nicolas Hytner, the veteran British director, captured the great dancing throughout the film but also kept the pace of the storyline moving along quite well. There were no big surprises in the plot, but if you signed up for a dance movie, you will not be disappointed, especially with the finale. (2000

Desert Dancer sp

Although Iran is known to have a repressive government, it still has one of the highest percentage of educated people in the world as well as having 60% of its 73 million people under the age of 30. Therefore, it would still seem surprising that any kind of dancing in Iran is forbidden. This movie shows the true story of a student at the University of Tehran who five years ago with the few other students began to secretly learn how to dance in order to express their emotions. They gathered at a deserted basement and studied forbidden YouTube videos. They knew that they could be beaten and even killed if discovered as had happened to many other young people who flaunted the authority of the President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and his paid thugs.

First time British director, Richard Raymond, read a newspaper article about  Afshin Ghaffarian, who led this group of dancers as they practiced and put on a performance in the desert for a small gathering of students who were secretly brought to this hidden recital. Ghaffarian’s life was threatened and he eventually made it out of Iran to Europe where he told this story. He then received further dance training and ultimately formed his own dance company, performing throughout the world.

Thanks to this film, the true story of the suppression of art and dance in Iran is told. It is also a metaphor for what is being done to the human spirit that is being highlighted here. Mr. Raymond put together a multi national cast of actors who were then taught to dance by Okram Khan, the choreographer of the opening night of the 2012 London Olympic Games. Although their names are not known to American audiences, their dedication to this story deserves to be recognized. Afshin Ghaffarian was played by Reece Ritchie. The other actors were Nazanin Boniadi, Freida Pinto, Tom Cullen, Makram J. Khoury, Marama Corlett and Daniel Bass. You probably won’t remember their names but you will remember this film. It will touch you and remind you how sad it is when the creative expression inside of us is not allowed to come out and how glorious it can be when it becomes free. (2015)

***

Afternoon of the Faun : Tanaquil Le Clercq rm- If you love ballet and are familiar with the great artists and choreographers  as well as the history of ballet you probably will very much enjoy this documentary film It is about a young girl who at age 14 was a talented student studying at a school run by the great Balanchine . Four years later she not only was dancing with him but soon after was married to him, although he was nearly 25 years her senior. Tanquil Le Clercq, known as “Tanny” had a long , lovely and distinctive physique. Her dancing not only inspired Balanchine but she was also said to be a muse for Jerome Robbins who created his famous Afternoon of a Faun for Tanny. She was one of the most famous dancers of her time until at the age of 27 she was struck down by polio, which was the plague of its time. This was a disease that unexpectedly would make its appearance and would especially  paralyze children and young adults. It could even be fatal. Salk’s amazing vaccine came on the scene a short time later. Tanny was forced to be in an “iron lung” which would help her breathe and then over several years graduated to a wheel chair from which she became a teacher of ballet. The film consists mostly of beautiful film clips of Tanny dancing with Balanchine and others. There are clips of people talking about this unusual woman and her life. Not only is there Balanchine and  Jerome Robbins, who was very close to her, but others such as Jacque D’Ambroise, Arthur Mitchell and a women who for many years was Balanchine’s secretary and assistant. Her insights, particularly into the thinking of her boss, captured some of the conflict that he must have had for loving and caring about Tanny, but pursuing his own career as he worked with other ballerinas, eventually leaving Tanny to marry another dancer. It is unfortunate that we never hear a meaningful interview with the main star of this film We come to care about her through the old movies of her performing her magnificent dancing and the glimpses of her beauty even in the later years. We also learn about her strength, intelligence and humor from excerpts of letters she wrote, which were read by an unseen actress in the film..  This all takes place  with the rich and melodic music of the ballet, which accompanies not only the dancing but also this moving story. If you don’t have a special relationship to ballet and dance this documentary film will probably not move you very much. But if you do, be prepared to be swept off your feet and be caught up in the true tale  of this beautiful and tragic person.(2014)

*****

Musical Chairs- sp    This is a movie from which you will learn something about people and about the heart. It is about music and it is about dance . It is about what can happen when a person suddenly finds him or herself  in a wheel chair for the rest of their life.  Director Susan Seidelman (Desperately Seeking Susan ) takes a screenplay  by Marty Madden and somehow does a perfect casting job starting off with E.J Bonilla, a young actor who plays  Armando with a flair for music, dance and the ability to project his intensity and his sincerity when he encounters Mia (Leah Pipes) a beautiful young dancer before and after her tragic accident. The story flows as smoothly as the music and the dance of this film. Most of the rest of the engaging  cast is this  young man’s  New York Puerto Rican second generation family who owns a restaurant and especially his  mother (Pricilla Lopez) who has to struggle with her aspirations for her son and her realization of his love for his new girlfriend. The other group of extraordinary colorful players in this film are the people in wheelchairs who find that they can express themselves in dance. In reality only one of the actors, Auti Angel, who plays Nicky is actually confined to a wheel chair. She was a promising professional dancer who has a true story that is not too far from the plot of this movie. Behind the scenes we understand that she assisted and inspired the actors in wheelchairs to take on their personas. We view this movie as fairy tales where things happen and people say and do things not quite the way they may happen in real life. It reminds us of a musical where it can be convenient to suddenly find a place to sing (or in this case a hospital gym at night to dance in a special way). The characters and some of the dialogue are somewhat clichéd. This doesn’t seem to really matter because the emotion and the message of the movie is very real. We think everyone should be able to relate to this film and learn something about the human spirit. We also think that it has the potential to live on by teaching young people in schools and be an inspiration for the thousands of people every year who find themselves in a place they never thought they would be.  Part of the storyline of the movie is a dance contest being held in New York labeled “The First International Wheelchair Dance Competition” In reality, while wheelchair dancing is big in Europe it hasn’t quite caught on in the USA. It would not surprise us if after this film is released and gets around we will see this event in some major city. That is part of the great potential of this movie.(2012)