Mme. Hermine Posted September 6, 2002 Share Posted September 6, 2002 quite by accident i've fallen on a copy of this one; joan collins plays the director of a dance company in london; she receives board members in her office and "treats" them to views of the unknowing dancers in the studio via a 1-way mirror! a russian ballerina (finola hughes) defects and takes a cab to joan's door, where she is immediately welcomed into the company . her initial impression of freedom in the west is gradually changed as she discovers how unhappy the dancers in the company are, and that it seems that the major method of fundraising is holding large costume parties for rich male benefactors at which the dancers, shall we say, are asked to be extra nice to the gentleman. so the russian ballerina gets her ultimate revenge by going back to russia and taking joan's entire company with her! complete with requisite (for this sort of thing) semi and general nude scenes and one of the most bizarre things i've ever ever seen. Link to comment
Leigh Witchel Posted September 6, 2002 Share Posted September 6, 2002 I hate to say it, but that sounds so incredibly awful as to be good in some twisted way. . . Link to comment
Alexandra Posted September 6, 2002 Share Posted September 6, 2002 Magnificentliy awful. There are these movies lying about. I have a video -- can't find it now, and I can't remember the name! -- where Fonteyn does a cameo as The Grand Ballerina who visits a local studio to give them prizes. It's wonderfully awful, the story of a poor but earnest dance student in London right after the war, who has to take about 5 buses to get to her dance classes. AND her evil rival who has enough ambition for the whole class. There's a fascinating, and witty, classthat shows the difference between Evil Rival and Good Girl Heroine. It's fascinating because a very bad dancer of that day is quite different from a very bad dancer of today. The Evil Rival has oodles of "soul" and no technique -- she primps, she preens, she has feet of jello. Since she doesn't get the leading role in the school show, what choice does she have but to lock the heroine in the basement? I forget how it ends -- happily. I think the heroine's little brother (played by Anthony Newley!) figures it out and rescues her. There were a lot of little ballet films like this in the '40s and '50s, I think -- but 1982 is late for the stinker Mme. Hermine describes. Quick! Cast Joan Collins in the international ballet repertory of that time. Link to comment
Leigh Witchel Posted September 6, 2002 Share Posted September 6, 2002 Joan Collins in The Mathilde Kchessinka Story? Did they wear shoulderpads in the 1890s? Link to comment
Mme. Hermine Posted September 6, 2002 Author Share Posted September 6, 2002 joan collins as carabosse! with costumes by nolan miller! ;) found this: i think i'll look for this one! LITTLE BALLERINA A girl struggles to become a ballet star battling poverty & a jealous rival. Margot Fonteyn, Anthony Newley, Martita Hunt & Yvonne Marsh. 1947 64 min. Link to comment
rg Posted September 6, 2002 Share Posted September 6, 2002 LITTLE BALLERINA is the film alexandra mentioned. Link to comment
Watermill Posted September 6, 2002 Share Posted September 6, 2002 ...while we're all holding our noses... What about the dreadfully fascinating Specter of the Rose (1946) with Dame Judith Anderson and Mihael Chekhov? Ben Hecht wrote & directed the overwrought screenplay about a "mad" male ballet star "Ivan Kirov" (!), played (and danced..um...eccentrically) by Andre Sanine (?) who obsesses over his new partner, "Viola Essen" played by the one-named Haidi. It has absolutely nothing to do with Spectre, and is choreographed by none other than Tamara Geva! Ivan's endlessly final solo as he dances "insanely" in a small hotel bedroom has got to be seen to be believed. If you don't believe me, here's a sample of dialogue: IVAN: Hug me with your eyes! VIOLA: I am. IVAN: Harder! Link to comment
Leigh Witchel Posted September 6, 2002 Share Posted September 6, 2002 I see a "Ballet Alert" Film Festival coming on. . . Link to comment
Mme. Hermine Posted September 10, 2002 Author Share Posted September 10, 2002 well there's the 'on the town' film where vera-ellen is miss subways and is pursued by sailor gene kelly, and has scenes of her private ballet lessons in carnegie hall, and her actual job as a kootch dancer at coney island! Link to comment
Alexandra Posted September 10, 2002 Share Posted September 10, 2002 Didn't Vivian Leigh play a ballerina in "Waterloo Station?" Not a ballet film, as such, but a dancer as a leading character. (Dirac will know this one, I'm sure. I've only seen this once, on tv, long ago.) Link to comment
Watermill Posted September 10, 2002 Share Posted September 10, 2002 I think you must mean "Waterloo Bridge" made in 1940. Miss Leigh (soon to be Mrs Olivier) is a ballet dancer ejected from her company by Ouspeska (the great Russian acting teacher) for coming home late (or something dancers do all the time) Thinking her fiance is dead in the War (WWI) she...well...needs to make rent...ahem...on the Waterloo Bridge. (Remember, this is post 1934 Censorship Code) So of course she's hit & killed by a truck! BTW: a favorite with Russian audiences. Remade as Gaby in 1956 with Leslie Caron (who actually dances in it) Link to comment
Alexandra Posted September 10, 2002 Share Posted September 10, 2002 Yep. That's the one, Watermill. And Leigh looks very like Fonteyn in it, I thought. (A four-hanky tearjerker.) Link to comment
Mme. Hermine Posted September 10, 2002 Author Share Posted September 10, 2002 and then there's "Limelight",in which charlie chaplin as a has-been vaudeville clown saves the life of claire bloom, a depressed ballet dancer that he finds starving (if i remember correctly) on the streets, where the actual dancing for claire bloom and her partner is done by melissa hayden and andre eglevsky, and for which i remember reading that chaplin did the choreography! (that would be interesting). but waterloo bridge and limelight certainly wouldn't qualify as stinkers, maybe our festival has to be a two-parter! Link to comment
Siren Posted September 12, 2002 Share Posted September 12, 2002 Oh my! Reading all these had me in stiches! The Joan Collins Nutcracker sounds just wonderfully awful. Is that video available? It sounds hilarious. Link to comment
Mel Johnson Posted September 12, 2002 Share Posted September 12, 2002 Maybe we can make some of these audience-participation movies like The Rocky Horror Picture Show! Link to comment
Juliet Posted September 12, 2002 Share Posted September 12, 2002 One of my favourite movie treats is the part of Invitation to the Dance where Claude Bessy steals and eats the guy's sandwich while doing pirouettes...and she doesn't forget the pickle. It's in the first section called Ring-around-the-rosy..... I simply must see that Joan Collins one--is it really called Nutcracker? It sounds like something Rumer Godden would have written.... No, really I think the best casting for Joan Collins would be Tamara Toumanova.....but who would we get for Mama? Link to comment
Mel Johnson Posted September 12, 2002 Share Posted September 12, 2002 My nominee for Ballet Golden Turkey is The Unfinished Dance, a horrifyingly bad Hollywood remake of the masterpiece Le Mort du Cygne, starring Claire Bloom, Cyd Charisse, Margaret O'Brien (or was it O'Sullivan, I always get them mixed up) and as the father, introducing...Danny Thomas!!!:eek: Link to comment
Siren Posted September 13, 2002 Share Posted September 13, 2002 I did a search for the Joan Collins Nutcracker and came up with two titles, which seem to be two different movies?: Nutcracker Nutcracker Sweets (the sequel, perhaps?) The scary thing here is that this is real. What an absolute hoot! This is just too good to be believed. I don't think Blockbuster carries it and the video lists for $70, I think. Too much for me, but boy would be this make for decliciously guilty viewing! Love the Rocky Horror suggestion. Link to comment
Alexandra Posted September 13, 2002 Share Posted September 13, 2002 Mel, The Unfinished Dance sounds suitably ..... well-cast for a Turkey Festival. Can you give us a plot synopsis? I've never heard of this one! Link to comment
Mme. Hermine Posted September 13, 2002 Author Share Posted September 13, 2002 found this: (let me know if i needed to edit etc. alexandra **********************************************CREDITS 1947, 101 minutes, Technicolor. Producer, Joe Pasternak; Director, Henry Koster; Screenplay, Myles Connolly and Paul Morand; Cinematography, Robert Surtees; Music Direction, Herbert Stothart; Choreography, David Lichine. CAST Meg Merlin, Margaret O'Brien; Mlle. Ariane Bouchet, Cyd Charisse; La Darina, Karin Booth; Mr. Paneros, Danny Thomas; Olga, Esther Dale; mr. Ronsell, Thurston Hall; Murphy, Harry Hayden; Josie, Mary Eleanor Donahue; Miss Merlin, Ruth Brady; mme. Borodin, Ann Codee; Jacques Lacoste, Gregory Gaye; Fred Carleton, Charles Bradstreet; Phyllis, Connie Cornell. SONGS Holiday for Strings by David Rose; I Went Merrily On My Way by Sammy Fain and Irving Kahal; excerpts from The Bartered Bride by Smetana; Swan Lake by Tchaikovsky; Faust by Gounod; Liebesfreud by Kreisler and Beethoven's Symphony No. 2. PLOT SYNOPSIS "The story of a poor orphan (O'Brien) and how her hero-worshipping devotion to a famous ballerina (Cyd Charisse) results in a tragic accident when, mistakenly believing newcomer Karin Booth to be a threat to Charisse's supremacy in the company, she inadvertently pulls the wrong switch during a performance, causing Miss Booth to fall through a trap door and injure her spine. . ." - Clive Hirschhorn, The Hollywood Musical NOTES ". . .a glossy but cloying remake of Jean Benoit-Levy's touching French film Ballerina (1938). . .it pulled all the wrong switches where the emotions were concerned, substituting bathos for pathos." - Clive Hirsachhorn, The Hollywood Musical "The same old story with pathos, humor and ballet substituted for pathos, humor and chorus girls." - MFB "The delicacies of the French original, La Morte du Cygne, give way to standard Hollywood hokum and produce an accomplished but totally uninteresting film." - Halliwell's Film Guide Link to comment
Mme. Hermine Posted September 13, 2002 Author Share Posted September 13, 2002 but!!!!!! i think i have a winner!!!!!! i remember seeing this one, and had almost forgotten it: it's called: (drum roll) Howling III - The Marsupials and the synopsis says: ********************************, the story centers around the existance of and subsequent hunt for a tribe of marsupial werewolves. Descended from the extinct Tasmanian Tiger, the tribe of marsupials have remained a secret until one of their own escapes to America and becomes a popular B Movie actress. Before long, other members of the tribe are sent to bring her back, attention is called to the tribe when she becomes famous and eventally, the marsupial tribe is being hunted through the outback by the military while a small band of humans race to protect them. Toss into the mix, werewolf nuns, a Russian werewolf ballerina, a 'Hitchcockian' B movie director and some other truly odd moments and you have a werewolf film unlike any other! Link to comment
Leigh Witchel Posted September 13, 2002 Share Posted September 13, 2002 OK Gang, any casting suggestions for the Russian Werewolf ballerina? [Running for the exit] Link to comment
Manhattnik Posted September 13, 2002 Share Posted September 13, 2002 OK Gang, any casting suggestions for the Russian Werewolf ballerina? Hmmm. Dark hair. Sharp, angular features. Feral smile. Strong and slightly scary. Transforms into something both more and less than human at night.... Nah, I'm drawing a blank. Link to comment
Mme. Hermine Posted September 13, 2002 Author Share Posted September 13, 2002 siren if you'd really like to see it the joan collins film i can arrange to get a copy to you, tho it won't be the best copy. it is every bit as bad as you can imagine. perhaps i can make one and there can be a round robin passing it from one BA member to another? i actually kind of have it by accident in that it was on a tape with something else someone gave me, and not even labeled! Link to comment
Mme. Hermine Posted September 13, 2002 Author Share Posted September 13, 2002 they just keep comin' folks. how about this: ************************************* L'AMANTE DEL VAMPIRO (1961/Consorzio Italiano Film/UA.) 86mins. BW. Italy. Aka: THE DANCER AND THE VAMPIRE; THE VAMPIRE AND THE BALLERINA; THE VAMPIRE’S LOVER. Sequel to: L'Ultima Preda del Vampiro. Credits: Dir: Renato Polselli; Prod: Bruna Bolognesi; Sc: Renato Polselli, Ernesto Castaldi & Giuseppe Pellegrini; Ph: Angelo Balstrocchi; Art: Angelo Baistrocchi; Sfx: Leopoldo Rosi & Raffaele del Monte; Mus: Aldo Piga. Cast: Walter Brandi, Maria-Luisa Rolando, Helene Remi, Iscaro Ravaioli, Tina Gloriani, John Turner. "Blood-lusting fiend who preys on girls! Vampire-queen who feeds on the lifeblood of men!" Two ballerinas, Luisa, (Remi), and Francesca, (Gloriani), seek refuge from a storm in a castle owned by a female vampire, (Rolando), and her leathery faced servant, (Brandi). Link to comment
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