CENTER STAGE A film review by Steve Rhodes Copyright 2000 Steve Rhodes RATING (0 TO ****): ** 1/2
DIRTY BALLET DANCING, released under the pseudonym of CENTER STAGE, tries to make the hard and competitive world of ballet dancing as much fun as rock and roll. Not since Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze cut a rug in the Catskills has a movie so wanted to demonstrate the sensuous joy of moving one's body to a beat. Although CENTER STAGE doesn't really find its groove until the last act, its dance numbers are well worth the price of admission. Just try to forgive the amount of celluloid director Nicholas Hytner (THE OBJECT OF MY AFFECTION and THE CRUCIBLE) wastes on the story's hackneyed romances.
Screenwriter Carol Heikkinen subscribes to the "one of" theory of script design, so the dozens of dancers include: one gay, one bulimic, one not skinny, one loud mouth, one black male and one Hispanic female. The rest are so interchangeable that you'll wish that they had numbers on them to make it easier to tell them apart. And since the writer doesn't want to make a choice, she tries to shoehorn in way too many stories, all at the expense of the dance sequences, which is the only reason to see the movie in the first place.
The story starts off promisingly as it shows how hard it is to get into the best ballet school and how much harder still to make it into "the company." One of the film's most instructive and fascinating segments has the ballet dancers using everything from fire to water in order to get their toe shoes into just the right shape. And once their practice sessions begin, their feet turn into bloody imitations of the moonscape. The dancers endure incredible pain for the slim chance that they'll hit the big time, and the chorus -- in which you can tell your friends that you're the third one from the left -- is the most that even the better students can realistically hope for.
After this ambitious start, the picture quickly bogs down into petty competition and light-weight love stories. One of the hardest parts of the story to believe is the excessive politeness with which dance instructors like Juliette (Donna Murphy) treat the students. Speaking almost in whispers, the instructors give their generally mild critiques. Light-years away from the drill instructor style that one would expect, they are so quiet that it's a miracle that the dancers can hear them.
But the story's limitations become mere quibbles when the dancing starts. The best of the dancers, Ethan Stiefel as Cooper Nielsen, amazes us with his high flying, twirling bravado. When he engages another in a dazzling dancing duel, there's never any question as to who will emerge as the winner. Although not his equal in technical skill, Amanda Schull as Jody Sawyer, plays the dancer with the most heart. When they perform the long ending sequence together, the movie sizzles, and the choreography wows us with its inviting originality. See it first on the big screen, and later, when it goes to video, hit the fast-forward button every time the dancing stops.
CENTER STAGE runs 1:53. It is rated PG-13 for language and some sensuality and would be fine for kids around 11 or 12 and up.
Email: Steve.Rhodes@InternetReviews.com Web: http://www.InternetReviews.com
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