SCREENINGS
& MEANINGS
By
Gerald Schmitz
In
Mao’s Last Dancer beautiful dreams are realized
Mao’s
Last Dancer
(Australia 2009)
When Thai director Apichatpong
Weerasethakul received the Cannes film festival jury’s “Golden
Palm” first prize on May 23, he told reporters, “I think
Thailand needs some kind of hope in other ways because we . . . are
very depressed about the confrontation of different ideologies.”
In fact, he barely made it to Cannes at all given the violent unrest
that has captured world headlines. His film, with the intriguing title
Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, was called a “beautiful,
strange dream” by jury president Tim Burton (Alice in Wonderland),
no stranger to fantasy.
The triumph of art over oppressive
political ideologies and circumstances is an uplifting storyline and
rich cinematic theme. If Thailand has fallen under military rule, it
at least has recent experience of democracy. Not so in the People’s
Republic of China where one-party dictatorship prevails. Yet even then,
strange beautiful dreams can sometimes come true. That is the subject
of Mao’s Last Dancer, a moving masterwork by 69-year-old veteran
Australian director Bruce Beresford. Best known for ‘Breaker’
Morant (1980) and Driving Miss Daisy (1989), he also made Black Robe
in 1991 about early Jesuit missionaries/martyrs in French Canada.
Last Dancer is based on the
extraordinary true story of Li Cunxin who recalled his past lives in
a 2003 bestselling autobiography. The screenplay adaptation is by Jan
Sardi, who also wrote the script for Shine, another amazing portrait
of a tormented artistic genius. Interestingly, a superb new Quebec film,
L’enfant prodige (“The child prodigy,” though no English
title as yet), about the short, tragic life of native son pianist André
Mathieu, known as the “Canadian Mozart,” had its world premiere
at the Shanghai Expo on May 9 and opened in Quebec theatres May 28.
Fingers crossed for a release in the rest of Canada.
Last Dancer’s scenario does a brilliant job of frequently shifting between Li’s time in the United States, where he was sent as an adult cultural exchange student in 1981, and his formative years in China. Going back to the beginnings, we see Li as a wide-eyed 10-year-old (played by Wen Bin Huang) in a regimented one-room rural schoolhouse in Shandong province. While not that far southeast from Beijing, it might as well be a million miles from the Communist regime’s glorious capital. Li is the sixth of seven children, the son of poor peasant parents, with no great expectations or prospects.
One day in 1971, in the midst of The Great Helmsman’s disastrous
Cultural Revolution, two stern-looking men arrive in the classroom.
They are scouring the country for potential talent to study in Madame
Mao’s dance academy in Beijing. Asked what he wants to be, Li
robotically replies: “I want to serve the Revolution and be a
Red Guard for chair Mao.” The dour party officials are about to
leave, finding “nothing here,” when the female teacher makes
a pitch for Li. It succeeds, and when no counter-revolutionary skeletons
are found in the family closet, the entire village celebrates the honour.
The little boy departs, bewildered and bereft of a loving mother and
father. He will never return.
Li is miserably lonely at the spartan academy, and not the best student.
But he is fully indoctrinated to follow the dictates of authority. The
training regimen is merciless. Accused of being weak, Li works extra
hard. As he matures throughout his teenage years, Li (now played by
Chengwu Guo) emerges as a highly skilled dancer. He responds to the
more enlightened tutorship of older teacher Han. When the segregated
sexes are brought together to learn the pas de deux, Li discovers an
aesthetic chemistry with one of the female students.
They are front and centre as Madame Mao (later to be denounced as part
of the “gang of four”) comes to watch a classic ballet performance.
She is not pleased. This is from the decadent West. Where is the depiction
of revolutionary struggle under Communist leadership? Back to the drawing
board until a militaristic gun-waving dance, The East is Red, finds
favour. “It’s not ballet,” winces teacher Han, who
will soon be taken away in the night for his wrong attitude.
The students, however, are left with his precious secret tape of the
Soviet defector, superstar Mikhail Baryshnikov, in full flight. Viewing
it clandestinely, Li in particular thrills to his spectacular movements.
Yet when the Houston ballet comes to an agreement with the Chinese government,
Li is considered ideologically solid enough to be sent to study with
the company. Its ambitious artistic director Ben Stevenson (a terrific,
swishy performance by Canadian Bruce Greenwood) hopes to be able to
tour China the following year. Arriving in his dowdy suit and wearing
a red Mao pin, Li is taken aback by his new surroundings, the gleaming
towers, Ben’s upscale apartment — how can these evident
riches be when China has the world’s highest living standards?
Li tries to resist temptation but fights a losing battle to stay ideologically
pure.
Taken under Ben’s wing, Li blossoms into a major talent. On a
key night in the Texan elite’s arts calendar, with Regan’s
vice-president George Bush Sr. in attendance, Li is suddenly called
upon to replace the injured principal dancer. A star is born as he brings
down the house.
But it doesn’t stop there. Li meets and falls in love with an
aspiring ballerina, “Liz” Mackey (Amanda Schull), whom Ben
considers not good enough to join the company. Li no longer wants to
leave when the Chinese consulate demands his return. High-profile attorney
Charles Foster (the excellent Kyle MacLachlan) enters the picture on
his side.
Li’s quick, furtive marriage to Liz sets off dramatic fireworks
leading up to his detention in the consulate and resulting media frenzy.
While held there Li has a nightmare of what might happen to his family,
imagining his parents being led to execution for his ideological sins.
Eventually Li is allowed to defect but exiled from China. There’s
a great real-life scene of Li’s mother chasing away badgering
party officials. It’s their fault after all for stealing her son.
The adult Li is magnificently portrayed by first-time actor Chi Cao,
a principal dancer at the Royal Birmingham Ballet. He is as believable
off stage as on, where his graceful gravity-defying leaps are truly
breathtaking. Despite earlier frictions with Ben and the company’s
patrons (no China tour anymore), he is offered a contract as principal
dancer. As Li’s fortunes rise, Liz feels increasingly left behind.
The marriage dissolves. She leaves while Li quickly moves on, relishing
his creative freedom. When Australian ballet diva Mary McKendry (Camilla
Vergotis) is brought in by Ben to take over as prima ballerina, Li becomes
enamoured of her.
Houston is good to both as the couple’s fame grows. One night
the performance is delayed as the audience awaits the arrival of surprise
special guests. Li and Mary dance a dazzling Firebird sequence from
Stravinsky’s pathbreaking The Rite of Spring. Looking out, Li
spots the tear-stained faces of his overjoyed parents. The charged atmosphere
builds up to a sensational moment of artistic triumph and never-expected
reunion. Eventually Li is also allowed back to visit his parents in
China, but nothing tops this climactic scene. Graeme Murphy’s
sublime choreography and Herbert Pinter’s set design add to its
emotional fervour.
Li later moved to Australia with Mary, becoming, of all things, a stockbrocker,
after his dancing career was over, the conversion from Communist indoctrination
to capitalist consent complete. The movie wisely doesn’t go there.
It is Li’s improbable journey to the top of the dance world that,
like his mesmerizing aerial acrobatics, is most memorable. While all
the actors are excellent, Cao, and Greenwood as Ben, are superlative.
The look of the picture, much of which was filmed in Australia as well
as the US, is completely authentic.
Mao’s Last Dancer is 132 minutes long in its current release,
up from a 117-minute runtime at last fall’s Toronto film festival.
I’m not particularly a ballet aficionado, but I thoroughly enjoyed
every minute. The movie obviously puts China in a poor ideological light,
and perhaps flatters the character of Li Cunxin. Still, all one can
say at the end is bravo!
Schmitz is a freelance writer based in Ottawa.
 |
|