Famous Ballerina

In 1948 public Britain produced a feature color film The Red Shoes about a ballet dancer. It is a “story within a story” movie. The outer story tells us about a talented young ballerina who joins a famous ballet company. She becomes the lead dancer in a new ballet called The Red Shoes. The inner story shows us an amazing ballet loosely based on the fairy tale The Red Shoes by H.C. Andersen. As in a fairy tale, a young woman desires to have a pair of red shoes in a store window. The demonic shoemaker offers them to a woman and she accepts unknowingly. But there is a terrible price to pay for this possession.

Why do you need to see it? Many reasons. The Red Shoes led to other films that treated ballet seriously. Even today The Red Shoes is considered a classic ballet movie of British cinema. It has original ballet music, brilliant cinematography, particularly its use of color.

The film stars famous Scottish ballerina Moira Shearer, actors Anton Walbrook and Marius Goring. It also features renowned dancers from the ballet world Robert Helpmann, Léonide Massine and Ludmilla Tchérina.

With the help of director Martin Scorsese The Red Shoes underwent a complete restoration. It took almost seven years but in the end the restoration work was completed. This restored version made its debut at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, followed soon after by a DVD and Blu-ray release as well as screenings at festivals around the world.
 

Famous Ballerina Pearl Argyle

Legendary ballerina Pearl Argyle was born in Johannesburg in 1910. she played an important part in the early years of British ballet. She made her debut in 1926 with Ballet Rambert. Then became ballerina with the Camargo Society. From 1935 to 1938 she was a principal dancer with Vic-Wells Ballet.

Pearl Argyle was an early muse to Frederick Ashton, leading international dancer and choreographer who created roles for her. In the thirties Pearl was so popular that she appeared not only on stage but also in films. She was noted for her outstanding beauty, her exquisite hands and arms.

In 1938 Pearl retired from ballet, married a film director and moved to America, where performed in several Broadway musicals. She had two children but died very young when she was only 36 years old.