Film Review - The White Crow - By Ceylan Karasapan Crow
By Ceylan Karasapan Crow
White Crow refers to a person who really stands out from the crowd, looks different, behaves differently, is perhaps incongruous and non conformist. Apparently Nureyev was called "white crow' as a child.
The Story
The story is based on the book by the journalist and former ballerina Julia Kavanagh "Rudolf Nuriev: The Life", released in 2007.
The Russian ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev came to Paris to tour with the Kirov ballet company in 1961 where he got a taste of freedom and experienced a world where he could cultivate his ambitions and become one of the best.
The film beautifully interweaves Nureyev’s past from the day he is born in a train, with the film's present event of a trip to France in 1961 when Nureyev is put under dire pressure and defects. Already at this young phase, Nureyev was recognized for his unique style and oustanding talent in Russia and abroad. His dancing was unique in that he strived in every way to break with the traditional male clasical ballet dancer role; he wanted to be more expressive and center stage as female dancers were traditionally poised to be in classical ballet.
Nureyev is played by Oleg Ivenko, a Ukrainian dancer who’s resemblance to Nureyev is amazing and his screen presence palpable. Even in his intense brooding silence we can feel the feelings and imagine the thoughts of the young dancer. So intense is his gaze and energy as to seem almost tangible, as if he is there with us in the room. I was taken by the young actor and how well he portrayed the obviously passionate, difficult, defiant and sometimes self absorbed character that was Nureyev. The young actor captured my attention and all my senses.
Ralph Fiennes one of my favorite screen artists, is the director and also plays Nureyev's teacher and mentor. In contrast to the emotional and stormy Nureyev the teacher is quiet, calm, in the background as it were. Fiennes acts with a depth that comes across and matches the passion and fury of the young actor with its contrasting grace, calm, humility and compassion.
The film switches on and off to sweeping black and white clips from Nureyevs' childhood, but we don't get a contiguous picture. As such, I felt the need to look up his bio and I was surprised to find that the clips do actually include most of the story of the younger Nureyev:
"Rudolf Nureyev was born on a Trans-Siberian train near Irkutsk, Siberia, Soviet Union, while his mother, Farida, was travelling to Vladivostok, where his father Khamet, a Red Army political commissar, was stationed. He was raised as the only son with three older sisters in a Tatar Muslim family.
When his mother took Nureyev and his sisters into a performance of the ballet Song of the Cranes, he fell in love with dance. As a child he was encouraged to dance in Bashkir folk performances and his precocity was soon noticed by teachers who encouraged him to train in Saint Petersburg (named as Leningrad 1924–1991). On a tour stop in Moscow with a local ballet company, Nureyev auditioned for the Bolshoi ballet company and was accepted. However, he felt that the Mariinsky Ballet school was the best, so he left the local touring company and bought a ticket to St. Petersburg.
Owing to the disruption of Soviet cultural life caused by World War II, Nureyev was unable to enroll in a major ballet school until 1955, aged 17, when he was accepted by the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet of Saint Petersburg, the associate school of the Mariinsky Ballet. The ballet master Alexander Ivanovich Pushkin (Played by Ralph Fiennes in the film) took an interest in him professionally and allowed Nureyev to live with him and his wife." *
* excerpt from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudolf_Nureyev
A must see, you will hopefully be totally transported by and absorbed in the drama of the story as I was.
The White Crow @ Rialto Cinemas
https://www.rialtocinemas.com/index.php?location=sebastopol&film=2019_white
Daily
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3:45 Bargain
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