The Red Shoes

Written, produced and directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, the 1948 film The Red Shoes is about a young ballerina who must chose between love and ballet - between married life and the life of a professional dancer. It stars Moira Shearer as the ballerina Victoria Page and Marius Goring as Julian Craster, the composer for the ballet company whom Victoria falls in love with. 

(I just discovered that Marius Goring was in Doctor Who in 1967, so I’ll have to find and watch those episodes now…)

Conflict and desire are driving forces in narrative and in the film the domineering impresario, Lermontov (Anton Walbrook) tempts Victoria with the promise of becoming a truly great prima ballerina.

The ballet of The Red Shoes is based on the Hans Christian Anderson fable. It tells the story of a young girl who puts on a pair of red ballet shoes, which she then cannot remove and must continue dancing despite how tired she gets, eventually leading to her death.

There are parallels between the ballet and Victoria’s own story. Being in the ballet company is where her passion lies, but it’s like putting on the red shoes – once she is a part of it there is no escape.

This of course alludes to the death of Victoria and she does eventually throw herself off a balcony into an oncoming train, overcome with the pressure of having to choose between the ballet and her husband. Although this was foreshadowed it was still an emotional scene and quite shocking to see.

The way it was cross cut with shots of Craster running towards her from the train station and Lermontov explaining to the audience of the ballet that she would no longer be dancing created a very powerful scene. It was haunting cinema and executed so well.

However the film then shows her after she jumped, alive after all, she asks Craster to remove the red shoes. While symbolic, this scene ruined the whole mood for me and left me feeling disappointed. The scene before it was so full of heightened emotion and had such an impact but that all completely disappeared after learning that she survived.

It is still an excellent piece of cinema and credit must go to cinematographer Jack Cardiff as well as the production designer who created a visually remarkable film. The sequence where Victoria dances the ballet of The Red Shoes really stood out to me in terms of the stylistic elements.

One thing I’m yet to understand is why anyone does ballet - if films such as this prove anything, it’s that no good ever comes of being a professional ballet dancer!