Dancing for Mr. B: Six Balanchine Ballerinas

If you're a ballet fan, this documentary is a must. Although it features six of Balanchine's great ballerinas (Maria Tallchief, Mary Ellen Moylan, Melissa Hayden, Allegra Kent, Merrill Ashley and Darcie Kistler), screen time is also given to Tanquil La Clerq and Suzanne Farrell. Like many other ballet documentaries, much more time is given to interviews than to performances, but in this case, in exchange for too-brief glimpses of his choreography, the viewer gains insight into the interaction between Balanchine and his dancers, and those interactions provide a pretty revealing insight into Balanchine's personal charisma and character. The dance scenes are wonderful but gravely undermined by fairly amateur photography and washed out color. The time span covered by the film is about 40 years and allows us to see Tallchief and other Balanchine favorites in their prime. They were a wondrous group and the moves that Balanchine taught them, often spontaneously, live on in the performances of their successors, often coached by Balanchine's own students. There are occasional glimpses of Balanchine himself at work, concentrating his attention on a single ballerina, taking advantage of attributes they alone possess and helping them to exceed themselves. This is a film, in other words, not just about performance but about creativity and about human beings who also happen to have been among the greatest artists in dance history.