THE TANGO LESSON By Harvey Karten, Ph.D. Sony Pictures Classics/Adventure Pictures Director: Sally Potter Writer: Sally Potter Cast: Sally Potter, Pablo Veron, Carolina Iotti, Zobeida, Orazio Massaro, Anne Fassio, Guillaume Gallienne
You don't have to be Argentinian to be quite proficient in the tango. Nor do you have to concentrate on the dance to the exclusion of all other skills. Ask Sally Potter, hardly a household name, known to many movie buffs exclusively for her direction of the remarkable arthouse fare, "Orlando." Her choice of subject there--a woman who lived four hundred years first as a man and later as a woman--indicates that Ms. Potter is no champion of bland, commercial films. Who would have known, though, that Sally Potter is not only a gifted director but a consummate dancer, a composer of song, and a performer who can swap a confident countenance for the gaze of a possessive lover?
"The Tango Lesson," which stars first-class dancer Pablo Veron as Pablo and Sally Potter as Sally--the use of real names manifests an autobiographical base--is both an occasional for an open-mouthed appreciation of spectacular hoofing and a sentimental romance about two middle-aged people who discover that they are soul mates despite their outward differences. Though Sally is a Londoner and Pablo an expatriate Argentinian living in Paris, they both speak fluent French and English and learn, surprisngly, that they share an affinity for Judaism. As Sally says, exchanging a sentimental tear with her partner, "I suppose I'm an atheist but I feel like a Jew." The film begins as Sally considers an assignment to write an original screenplay, her walls as white as the blank paper which confronts her. Our insight into her wild imagination is bumped as the camera shifts to glorious color, displaying three fashion models, one of whom is chased by wheelchair- bound, legless man who fires a shot, apparently killing her. We find out later that her film is to be about a designer who becomes envious of the attention which the media focus on the models. Wandering into a Paris concert featuring a tango performance of Pablo and his long-term partner played by Carolina Iotti, she is mesmerized and cuts a deal with Pablo. If he will teach her the tango, she will feature him in her next movie. From there, "The Tango Lesson" is divided into vignettes called "the second lesson," "the third lesson," etc. blending exhibits of the dance with a personal story, as Pablo and Sally become romantically involved with each other. Attempting to sell her idea to a couple of Hollywood producers, she is told by them--amid a stereotypically comical background of a large, Hollywood swimming pool presided over by a couple of movie sharks--that she should use stars rather than unknowns, situate the film in New York, and forget about using French because with a foreign language "you'll lose 75% of the audience, minimum." The tension apparently comes from Sally's insistence on leading Pablo while they are on the dance floor just as she is accustomed to doing when directing her movies. The tension in her shoulders about which Pablo complains is interpreted by him as a desire to dominate the relationship, but while this aspect is meant to be at the core of "The Tango Lesson," it simply does not come across. When the two perform on stage, ostensibly after she has had only twelve lessons, they look spectacular and garner a rousing tribute from the audience. Pablo's motivations are obscure. Is he really annoyed at her dominance or does he seek an excuse to end their relationship? Potter's use of black-and-white for the bulk of the picture seems pretentious rather than effective. "The Tango Lesson" succeeds more as a semi- documentary on that remarkable dance than as a romance, though any amour between middle-aged people should be welcomed in a youth-obsessed cinema. You come away with the knowledge that tango, like flamenco, can be performed in both its a traditional and authentic variety on a crowded dance floor and as a sexy bit of footwork meant for the stage featuring coded, suggestive steps. You also come away appreciating Sally Potter's talent as not only the director of "Orlando," a story about a Renaissance woman, but as a Renaissance woman herself. Rated PG. Running Time: 101 minutes. (C) 1997 Harvey Karten
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