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New York City Ballet: Bringing Balanchine Back
R1 - America - City Lights Media Review written by and copyright: James Teitelbaum (30th November 2008). |
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The Film
 Russian choreographer George Balanchine was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, and educated at the legendary Mariinsky school. This is the school at which Tschaikovsky created "The Sleeping Beauty" and "The Nutcracker", and is also where famous dancers like Ninjinsky and Baryshnikov were trained. After attaining some success at the Mariinsky, Balanchine emigrated to the United States of America, where he eventually became a key player in the New York Ballet Company. Balanchine is said to have choreographed at least four hundred and fifty works for ballet, modern dance, and for Hollywood. In 1962 and again in 1972, at the height of the Cold War, he took the New York Ballet Company to his home turf of St. Petersburg. The performances those two years were received with some measure of criticism. Thirty-five years after the second of Balanchine's homecoming performances, The New York Ballet Company returned to St. Petersburg for another series of concerts at the Mariinsky. Taking place during "White Nights", the perpetual daylight of the St. Petersburg summer, the performance is a success, although things do not always go smoothly. The ballet must contend with travel issues, a stifling heat wave, jet-lagged dancers, a whole orchestra vanishing - after swapping members on a daily basis, plus arrogant Russians doubting the ability of the Americans to do their art justice, a tight perfrormance schedule, a young lead dancer who proves not ready for her role, and the memory of the lukewarm reception received in the past decades. Performing to Tschaikovsky and Bizet on the first night, the young troupe (average age twenty-one) aquit themselves admirably. Many of the dancers are interviewed. We also meet the creative staff of the New York Ballet, the techincal staff, and also the Russian counterparts to all of these people. Narrated by Kevin Kline, who also takes us on the occasional historical digression, "Bringing Balanchine Back" should be interesting to ballet fans on any continent. Once the company gets on stage at the Mariinsky, ballet fans will be rewarded with several long segments of uninterrupted dancing, shot mostly from the perspective of an audience member, but also occasionally moving onto the stage for a glimpse into what is happening in the wings. The New York Ballet Company turns in a great performance, fully aquiting themselves as they proceed through a series of pieces by a variety of 19th and 20th century composers. Even the troubled Alexandria - the girl who wasn't ready on the morning of her scheduled debut - finally gets her big moment. The company wraps things up with Kay's Western Symphony, symbollically bridging the gap between the East and the West. On a techincal level the film has a few problems; camera work seems indifferent and is often out of focus or badly framed. There are also a few questionable editing choices. A bit too often, random incongruous insert shots seem to be used as placeholders when the editors had nothing else to cut to. These issues might bother the cinemaphile, but those interested in this production for a glimpse into an interesting event in the history of the New York Ballet Company will probably be perfectly satisfied with this documentary.
Video
Aspect ratio is 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen. There are some big compression issues here, most noticably during the performance sequences. Edge enhancement is really noticable, banding is rampant, and bouts of excess pixelation are very distracting. Some of the whites are a bit hot. A lot of the documentary footage was shot on cameras that seem to range from professional gear to camera phones carried by memebers of the company. This is to be expected in a modern documentary. However, one would expect a certain level of quality from the perfromance footage. Don't.
Audio
The audio is presented in English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo. The interviews are adequately audible, but it seemed that the orchestra could have been brought up in the mix a little bit during the performance sequences. The troubled and troublesome orchestra hit a few bad notes here and there during the performance, but they aren't bad enough to completely derail the Stravinsky or Phillip Glass being played. There are no optional subtitles available on this film.
Extras
City Lights have released this film with a series of five featurettes. Below is a closer look at these supplements. "Peter Martins On Balanchine" featurette runs for 2 minutes 43 seconds; Martins speaks from within small window in the middle of your screen. Kinda like a YouTube video. "Valery Gergiev on the Mariinsky Theater" featurette runs for 1 minute 57 seconds; Gergiev speaks from within small window in the middle of your screen like the previous clip. "Auroramary Dunleavy on Mr. B" featurette runs for 2 minutes 37 seconds; Dunleavy speaks from within small window in the middle of your screen about the choreographer. "Darci Kistler on Balanchine" featurette runs for 1 minute 33 seconds; Kistler speaks from within small window in the middle of your sceen. "Tour of the Mariinsky Theater" featurette runs for 2 minutes 33 seconds; An unnarrated walk-though of the beautiful theatre set to some sloppily edited music. Great for those of you who will never visit St. Petrsburg.
Overall
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