The Red Shoes

The Red Shoes (Criterion #44). 1948 The Rank Organisation & Janus Films.
Starring: Moira Shearer, Anton Walbrook, Marius Goring
Directors: Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger
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Arguably Powell and Pressburger's most famous work, The Red Shoes is a Technicolor masterpiece of an adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's (that's me!!) story of the same name, where a selfish girl acquires a pair of red shoes and finds that they're controlling her life the moment she starts to dance and can't stop.

Struggling composer Julian Craster (Goring) attends a performance of the Lermontov Ballet Company, where he recognizes his own music being used without his permission during a production of "Hearts of Fire". Julian protests to the company director Boris Lermontov (Walbrook), who hires him to compose the music for his next ballet, a version of "The Red Shoes". Boris also hires the attractive new dancer Victoria Page (Shearer) to perform, and Victoria is quickly cast into the starring role after the original lead ballerina announces her plans to wed, which hurts Boris.

"The Red Shoes" ballet, shown in a fifteen minute sequence, is a smash hit, and Victoria becomes a star overnight. Boris, though, finds out that she and Julian are madly in love, which prompts him to fire Julian fron the production, and Victoria goes with him. Boris allows Victoria to dance when and where she pleases, except for any future productions of "The Red Shoes", which he owns the rights to, as well as owning Julian's score. As long as Boris is working, he will not allow anyone else to produce it.

Meanwhile, Julian's compositions have made him a worldwide success, and he and Victoria are happily married. Boris runs into Victoria in Paris, and he invites her to perform one engagement of "The Red Shoes" in Monaco. Julian cancels one of his own performances to talk Victoria into coming back home with him, but she is torn over what she wants to do. Julian leaves, and right before her first appearance onstage, Victoria (wearing the red shoes) rushes out of the theater towards the train station. Julian sees her and rushes to meet her, but she jumps from a balcony and into the path of an approaching train. Before being taken away in the ambulance, a dying Victoria asks Julian to remove her red shoes, just like the end of the ballet. At the theater, a devastated Boris addresses the audience to tell them that Victoria would not be performing that night, "nor indeed any other night". The show still goes on, with a spotlight on the empty space that was intended for Victoria.

An interesting movie, which is also a favorite of Martin Scorsese, who, to my knowledge, has never directed a movie about ballet. Highly recommended.