Umirayushchiy lebed

Early ballet films followed the pattern of the Romantic-era ballet craze of its popular staged librettos where the dancers, almost supernatural in their movements, would invariably die at the end of the show wrapped in tragedy. The earliest existing ballet movie inspired by this century-old tradition is Russia's 1917 "The Dying Swan."

The mute heroine, played by Vera Karalli, is spurned by an admirer and seriously takes up ballet. Performing the original 1905 Anna Pavlova-dance, "The Dying Swan," in public, Karalli is spotted by an artist who is fixated by the illusion of death. He's sees something in her face that speaks of despair and ending it all. He convinces her to model for him with that look of gloom. But the earlier admirer returns to the scene, sparking a newfound energy in Karalli's face. This is when the movie's macabreness takes a twisted turn.

"The Dying Swan" was directed by Yevgeni Bauer, who had been called "the first true artist in the history of cinema." (See 1913's "Twilight of a Woman's Soul." ) Producing over 80 movies, he broke his leg on the set while directing his next film, "On Happiness." The later movie suffers because of his injury, as well as his last movie, "The King of Paris," when he was forced to direct in a bathchair while soaking his leg. While he was overseeing "Paris," Bauer came down with pneumonia. He was rushed to a Yalta hospital and died there June, 1917 at 52 years old. An actress in the movie stepped in to finish directing. His departure occurred just before Russia's transformation to Marxism in October roiled its movie industry, turning its independent cinema into a propaganda outlet for the government.

As for Vera Karalli, she played in several Bauer films and cited "The Dying Swan" as one of her best performances. A mistress to the Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich of Russia, first cousin to Tsar Nicholas II, she was at the palace of a co-conspirator with her lover the night the Tsarina Alexandra's confidant, Grigori Rasputin, was killed in December 1916. She fled Russia soon after the October Revolution and settled in Austria, living a long life teaching ballet.

Sadly, Yevgeni Bauer would die soon after this, a morbid reminder in and of itself that life sometimes reflects art first. And in viewing "Umirayushchii Lebed" it is nearly impossible to not think that Bauer was not influenced by the literary works of Edgar Allan Poe. There are too many parallels there. Particularly the influence of women on the lives of the two men.

While Bauer's earlier marks in film were more technical, it is the acting and Zoya Barantsevich's story that shines this time around. The cast is similar to his earlier "Posle Smerti" and again employs Vera Karalli as its star. Karalli plays a beautiful dancer (the dying swan) who tragically is also a mute. When the first suitor of her life breaks her heart a lonely artist becomes totally enthralled by her beauty as well...but in a completely different way.

Andrej Gromov plays this second of the two men in her life and does a masterful job of showing us an unhappy, dark, mysterious man-on-a-mission...for lack of a better term. The outdoor locations at the beginning of the film portray a happy world where the lovely Karalli lives with her loving father before her fateful meeting with Gromov. And once again Bauer shows us his fascination with dreams and their meaning, particularly as they coincide with the films ironic conclusion. And the film again features a nice score; this time by Joby Talbot and his violin-cello-piano trio.

The nutshell: not technically groundbreaking such as Bauer's "Posle Smerti" was but still comes across as more enjoyable because of its acting, storyline, and emotional response from the viewer. Again, not a feature length film but worth checking out...8/10.

Is the unmarked passage of time from one scene to the next a reflection of inadequacy of film-making, that the film flows so freely from start to finish - or is it an artistic expression of the great fluidity of life, of how time flies? Is the separation of the narrative into distinct scenes that don't always mesh perfectly together, slightly fragmented and less organic than in other silent films, an indication of stilted storytelling and film-making - or is it an artistic expression of how with the passage of time memories are often distilled into discrete moments more than a whole tale from start to finish? I suppose one could argue either way; cinema is an art, and art is subjective. I think it's fair to say that 'The dying swan' isn't a picture likely to appeal to viewers who aren't already enamored of the silent era; however one considers its construction, this bears the type of more staggered sequencing that is one of the aspects to turn off modern audiences.

For any subjective weaknesses, though, there is much to appreciate here. Above all, I think the writing is quite solid, if light and uncomplicated by the standards of all the years since. Zoya Barantsevich concocted an engaging narrative, one that turns unexpectedly dark and could feasibly be heralded, to some extent, as an early example of psychological drama. Scenes ably keep our attention as they build the story, and while characters are also perhaps less complex than what audiences are accustomed to from subsequent pictures, but are nonetheless varied, with strong personalities and a measure of depth. As a matter of retrospective tracing the progression of the art form, but also on its own merits, I think Barantsevich's screenplay holds up admirably well.

Director Yevgeni Bauer is noted for his contributions to the advancement of film as art, and as 'The dying swan' runs on, one finds more and more shots and scenes that help to articulate that reputation. Following from Barantsevich's groundwork, Bauer illustrates a keen eye for composition that minds the placement of actors in a shot; the camera's placement relative to a background; the arrangement of shots to reveal or withhold visual information as is appropriate for storytelling purposes in any given moment; camera movement, however modest, which seems like a strong development for cinema in 1917; and, among still other considerations, robust and dynamic lighting. To be sure, 'The dying swan' is very simple on the surface, but there's ultimately a lot going on here, from every angle, and it's a pleasure as watch as a cinephile.

The cast likewise demonstrates fine capabilities with performances of nuanced range, poise, and physicality. With each character exhibiting definite traits to set them apart, each actor gives a wonderful portrayal exploring those roles with all the space available to them. This is especially true of Andrej Gromov as the morose, obsessed artist Glinskiy, and still more for Vera Karalli as dancer Gizella; her part especially is written with swings from one one mood to another, and she navigates those shifts quite deftly.

There's unmistakably a simplicity to the story, and an ease to relationships between characters unsaddled by realistic complications, that rather make impressions as shortcuts in the telling. Whether one wishes to chalk this up to contemporary necessities of a developing medium, or a shortcoming of this specific instance, is maybe up for debate. Yet what it ultimately comes down to is that the chief issues one may claim of the title are nothing that aren't common to silent films at large. And that at once emphasizes both that, again, this probably is a feature for those who already enjoy early cinema - and that 'The dying swan,' in and of itself, is a title that is decidedly rich and worthy. Even clocking in at only a hair under 50 minutes, I think this is a fine way to spend one's time for anyone who appreciates movie history.

A mute ballet dancer is jilted in love and finds herself crossing paths with a deranged artistic noble and inevitable tragedy results. Good directing and good acting make this slow-going film worth the watch. The mousy and odd-looking but charming Vera Karalli acted well considering she started out as a ballerina. The film features a segment of her dancing and what an inspired moment in film and a marvel of fate it survived for posterity. If only the same can be said for Nijinsky. This melodramatic decadent curio from the dying age of the Tsars is a dated but charming remnant from the distant past.

Only ten months after the January 1917 release of the film, the whole Russian worldview was going to be torn asunder. The Soviet cinema that emerged post- 1922 was going to commit itself in the pursuit of the mechanisms that drive forward the eye, a collective eye that did not contemplate any more but would set in motion by seeing.

So, this is a really precious film to have, I think; a snapshot of the world about to be swept aside, and the transfiguration of the core of that world in terms of cinema.

So, whereas with Eisenstein or Pudovkin, the heroic focus shifts on the disenchanted individual - the faces tired but resolute, the living hard but rigorously driven - who is transformed, subsumed into a mass of collective struggle redolent with immediate purpose, Bauer's films shows a life distraught with aimlessness, women as fragile, ethereal beings - a far cry from Pudovkin's Mother - and the members of a decadent aristocracy, the ruling class not quite able to even rule their own lives, as entombed in morbid fixations with images of the past. Faces are nervous, agitated, sunken from inner weights.

In Daydreams it was the image of a dead wife; here it is the image of a ballerina, the swan with broken wings, as evoking the essence of death. The young painter will eventually have to stage the picture of death he wants to immortalize.

On the whole, this one more gloomy than Bauer's rest, it evokes an atmosphere of Poe; a tragic, romantic exaltation of woe. It's potent as Gothic romance but - like Poe - rather comfortably nudged in its archaism. It's not something I will keep with me, unlike Daydreams and its Vertigo-esque dizziness.