Rated M, 2
hrs 7 mins
Dendy Canberra Centre and
Palace Electric New Acton
3.5 Stars
Review © Jane Freebury
Before the
great Russian dancer Rudolf Nureyev defected to the West in June 1961 and
became a household name, he had one or two decisions to make. He was
challenging convention with a new approach to male roles on the ballet stage
but behind the scenes he was working out his sexual preferences, and whether he
preferred a life of freedom in the West to constraint behind the Iron Curtain.
Actor and
director Ralph Fiennes has taken on this fascinating time in Nureyev’s life,
handling it all with intelligence and restraint. The screenplay for White
Crow is by the great English screenwriter David Hare whose writing was behind unforgettable films
such as Wetherby, Damage and The Hours.
Construction
on the Berlin Wall would soon begin and to some extent East-West relations were
still in the balance, when Nureyev (Oleg Ivenko) was visiting the West as a
member of the Kirov Ballet. Depicted as more outgoing and incautious than the
rest, Nureyev formed friendships with other dancers and an enigmatic young
widow Clara Saint, played by Adele Exarchopolous, (in such contrast to her role
in Blue is the Warmest Colour) with whom
he might have had an affair had she been more forward or he more
inclined to women. Their finely balanced relationship is ultimately critical in
Nureyev’s escape from his Russian minders.
Fiennes
would have been the first to admit he didn’t know the first thing about ballet.
Expertise was brought in to advise him, but Fiennes is clearly more interested
in the man’s character than the fiery flamboyance Nureyev deployed while
wearing tights. It was something about Nureyev’s ‘ferocious sense of destiny’
that interested him, he has said.
The outsider
perspective builds a broader platform for White Crow than specialist
interest. Most of the dance sequences actually take place during classes or
rehearsals, when temperament isn’t held so much in check.
 |
| Nureyev (Oleg Ivenko) and Yuri Soloviev (Sergei Polunin) |
With
chiselled jaw, full lips and imperious manner, dancer Ivenko looks the part,
even if he is not, I’ve read, as similar in style to Nureyev as other dancers
cast here, like Sergei Polunin, who has a lesser role here. The casting choice
also suggests Fiennes was more interested in Ivenko’s ability to portray
personality rather than his dance performance.
Fiennes has
put himself in the frame, speaking Russian too. Not one to make life easy for
himself, he plays Nureyev’s teacher, Pushkin, who offers the young man a bed at
his home while recuperating from an injury. Pushkin’s wife Xenia (Chulpan
Kamatova) instigates an affair with the charismatic young man.
Contentious
roles have seemed a magnet for Fiennes as an actor, which makes him often
interesting to watch. His directorial debut with Coriolanus, based on
the Shakespeare play set in ancient Rome, when a principled general felt
compelled to commit treason, was another fascinating tale of transgression and
betrayal at high level.
Aspects of
Nureyev’s character are fleshed out with beautiful moody flashbacks in
near-monochrome from his impoverished upbringing in Siberia, but I was still
left wondering what was really going on behind the strong features and
imperious stance. The White Crow is interesting and impeccably made, but
for this viewer, the gestures towards Nureyev’s famous future don’t provide
enough to show why he was so thrilling and fascinating a figure after his
defection.
Still, it’s
good to see how The White Crow taking back some of the ground lost for
ballet by Darren Aronofsky’s hysterical Black Swan with Natalie Portman
that won many accolades in 2010. In Fiennes’ new film, Russian tempestuousness
and flamboyance meet British reserve with finely honed results.
Jane's reviews are also published on her blog, by the Film Critics Circle of Australia, and broadcast on ArtSound FM MHz 92.7