The Red Shoes tells the dramatic story of a young ballerina, Victoria Page, who is torn between two opposing forces: the composer who loves her and the impresario determined to fashion her into a great dancer. The sequence of shots that I have chosen portrays the young Victoria Page dancing for a small, crowded audience at the Mercury Theatre before her claim to fame. The great ballet impresario, Boris Lermontov sits amongst the crowd, watching Victoria’s every dance step with critical intensity as she dances in a production/reproduction of Swan Lake. This moment is significant to the rest of the movie in two ways—1. It marks the first time Boris acknowledges Victoria, and takes her under his wing, and 2. It marks the last time we see the audience in the ballet performances. This sequence of shots not only reveals the suture of the audience into the performance, but also Michael Powell’s critique of mechanical reproduction and the loss of what Walter Benjamin refers to as the auratic experience.
Shot 1 is a slow zoom in on a poster outside the Mercury Theatre advertising a limited performance of Swan Lake given by Victoria Page. The shot shows two poster images pasted on top of the other. The poster on top reads: “Reappearance of Victoria Page in Lac des Cygnes, for one performance only by special permission of “The Ballet Lermontov.” The shot zooms into the center of the shot in which the words “Royal Philharmonic Orchestra” are daintily placed. The diegetic sound of rain slowly fades into the background as the music of Swan Lake fades in.
Shot 2 is a close up of a record player in which the musical record is spinning in a continuously circular motion. Shot 3 shows a ceiling fan spinning similarly in a circular way and displays a large loudspeaker placed next to the ceiling fan.
These first three shots are extremely significant in showing Walter Benjamin’s idea of Mechanical Reproduction. Shot one uses a zoom—a function that the camera, a piece of mechanical equipment can perform easily, but one that our human eye cannot easily imitate. The zoom conditions our eye to a certain place on the screen, it forces our human eye to look where the camera wants us to look, and forces us to see in the same manner that it sees. And just what is it that Powell would like us to see? Our vision is pulled towards the zooming point, or the shot’s center of gravity—in this case, the words on the poster that come to our attention are: “Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.” As the sounds of the rain fade out and the music of the orchestra fade in, we, the audience, are temporarily tricked into thinking that we are hearing the music played by an orchestra. The words on the poster mislead us. Instead, the immediate transition to shot 2 reveals that we are actually hearing the music from a record, a mechanical reproduction of the original live piece of music. The presence of music and the immediate transition to the source of the music is an interesting play on the shot reverse shot. In this case, instead of being a shot reverse shot, it is a bit like a sound reverse shot where the source of the music is revealed by replacing the absent one (the music during shot 1) with the signifier (the record player in shot two) .
However, these first two shots are not only critiquing the mechanical reproduction of music, but they are also highlighting ad reproduction. In shot one, the focus of the shot is of an advertisement for the show. Advertising in itself is a media that is for the public masses. Throughout most of history, art has been a product for the elite—only the high patrons, the few including kings, queens, prominent statesmen, and religious leaders had access to art. It is only with the increasing infiltration of Marxist ideals that art has been changed into a product for the masses. But several Marxists warn of consequences in industrializing art. Clement Greenberg, a prominent Marxian disciple, talks of the disparity between two forms of art—the avant-garde which he refers to as high art, and the “kitsch”, a lower decorative art of sorts—the kind of art made available through mass production. He writes in his essay that it is through “kitsch” that totalitarian regimes can seize political control through the arts (as in Triumph of the Will). In the film The Red Shoes, Boris Lermontov is just that fascist figure. He alone chooses which ballets to portray, which dancers shall dance, which musicians shall compose—he has sole control over the product that he produces and I will even go as far to say that he has complete control over his audience. This is made obvious in the first few scenes of the film in which the audience is shown to be completely reverent of Lermontov, and the fact that all of his ballets have been successful simply because they have been productions of the “Lermontov Ballet.” Simply with his name, Boris can sway thousands to his ballet performances. Though his product is for the masses, Boris also seems to maintain a high quality control over his “kitsch” product. Michael Powell, in essence, seems to compare the quality of Boris’s ballets to his own filmmaking. Both productions (film and theater) are for the mass audiences; however, they also seem to maintain their semblance of Walter Benjamin’s aura in their respective products. Victoria shines in her final repertoires with the Lermontov Ballet, and The Red Shoes shines as a film full of auratic characters and cathartic experiences. Both Lermontov and Powell also therefore seem to deny their own political power as mass media. Boris repents Victoria’s death in the end—he regrets his own ownership over his dancer, his product, and with the conclusion of the film, Powell allows the audience to retreat back into our realities.
The incredible auratic, and surrealistic dance sequence can be seen if you click HERE.
Similar to Greenberg, the early 20th century English art critic Roger Fry addresses this problem in that he concluded “Mass production was likely to have negative effects, because of the discouragement to spontaneity and the high costs of design changes that put designers out of work. The one compensating benefit from industrialization for artists that he could discern came from their employment in the creation of advertising materials (Goodwin, 3).” Fry is saying that mass production reduces the quality, the aura of the final art product, and advertising is no different. Advertising in itself therefore, is a Marxist industry. Shot one in the movie makes the allusion to mechanized labor, industrious art labor behind the advertisement. The words on the sheet of drenched paper are printed neatly in different fonts, presumably by art laborers in the new age of mechanized factories. Though the advertisement makes reference to the labor that has gone into the product, there is a lack of humanness in that final product. Walter Benjamin would say that there is an increased distance from the original aura of the product. Yet ironically, shot one zooms into the advertisement, closing the distance between the audience and the object—it allows us to examine that object closely and create new meaning from it. The film therefore creates a new aura from the “kitsch” object through the language and form of film. Advertisement as an artistic form can be considered “kitsch” art—it not only serves as a created piece of low end art, but also has a useful purpose in that it sways certain public opinions or actions. Greenberg writes, “If kitsch is the official tendency of culture in Germany, Italy, and Russia, it is not because their respective governments are controlled by philistines, but because kitsch is the culture of the masses in these countries, as it is everywhere else. The encouragement of kitsch is merely another of the inexpensive ways in which totalitarian regimes seek to ingratiate themselves with their subjects. (Harrison, 548)” In the context of the times, “kitsch”, when fused with politics becomes dangerous—just as advertisement when fused with political agenda becomes powerful propaganda. Here, the seemingly innocent advertisement in shot one is not only a reference to industrious art labor, but also serves as commentary upon the times of this film’s making—it raises the question of the control that media, that “kitsch” art has over the public people.
The environment in which the advertisement is placed also exemplifies this point. The ad is placed on a plain wall outside the theatre—it is placed in a public domain and it was created in order to sway the public demand towards the “high arts.” The advertisement is “kitsch” that is made by the common people for the common people—in its function to sway then, the advertisement serves as a kind of “soft propaganda.” But while characters inside the film can look at this advertisement and choose whether to go inside the Mercury Theatre to watch the performance, we, the viewers of this film have no such option. The irony is that the film itself allows us to read the advertisement for the public performance upon a wall, but does not allow us to make the decision of accepting or rejecting the subsequent viewing of the performance. The form of film itself directs what we see and what we hear—it controls our perception, even if only for the length of the movie. Does not this then imply the fascism of film itself?
Shot three further emphasizes the mechanical reproduction with the spinning fan and centered shot of the loudspeaker. The repetitive motion of the record player indicates mechanical motion in shot 2, and this motion is echoed in shot three with the spinning fan. The centered shot of the loudspeaker reveals again where the sound is coming from—a machine. With these first three shots, Powell reveals the increasing industrialization of society, and the result of increasing art productions and reproductions. Walter Benjamin talks of reproductions and their depreciating value from the original, “One might subsume the eliminated element in the term “aura” and go on to say: that which withers in the age of mechanical reproduction is the aura of the work of art…One might generalize by saying: the technique of reproduction detaches the reproduced object from the domain of tradition.(668)” In a later part of the same scene, Powell dedicates a segment in which the record player conspicuously skips a beat. The mistake is caused by increasingly new technology, and this mistake emphasizes Benjamin’s point of loss in the aura of an art piece with its reproductions.
Powell is highly aware of auratic loss through reproduction. In fact, a main premise of the fictional storyline emphasizes the tension between “good art” and “great art” or between what Greenberg would classify as “kitsch” and the “avant-garde.” Fraser addresses this point when he writes, “The fundamental narrative tension in The Red Shoes is at root the tension of good art versus great art. Both Victoria Page and Julian Craster learn in the early scenes of the movie that greatness is not achieved by degrees, but rather by dimensions…the impossibility of integrating great art and good art is equated in the narrative with the impossibility of mixing romance with artistic commitment. (Fraser, 48-49)” Here the film is then self-reflexive in that it addresses this gulf between good and great art not only through the storyline of the film but also as a new media for the masses. The Red Shoes ends with Victoria’s suicide in which she could not choose between her love for Julian and her love for dance—she could not choose between compromising the “high art” (love for dance) for a lower imitation of it. The tragedy of the storyline brings out our own reaction in that we believe there must be a compromise that would prevent this tragedy—and on a greater sphere we also believe that there must be a compromise between the kitsch and the avant-garde. Powell brings out this idea therefore that though film is a product for the masses, it is not simply a low art. Film in itself can create new auratic experiences that all masses can therefore take part in—it is a media that is both widespread and powerful.
Shot 4 is a centered wide shot of an audience looking towards the camera. The room is dimly lit and the theatre feels small, rustic, and slightly claustrophobic with its dingy blue walls and worn out rugs. The audience consists of men, women, children, with various expressions on their faces as they observe the spectacle in front of them.
The fullness of the image—the fact that it is a wide shot filled to the brim with a diverse amount of people, emphasizes machinery and art as a product of the proletariat. Benjamin writes, “By making many reproductions it substitutes a plurality of copies for a unique existence. And in permitting the reproduction to meet the beholder or listening in his own particular situation, it reactivates the object reproduced. These two processes lead to a tremendous shattering of tradition which is the obverse of the contemporary crisis and renewal of mankind. Both processes are intimately connected with the contemporary mass movements. (668)” Throughout history, art has been only enjoyed by the elite few, yet art reproduction has brought its product to the common crowd, the masses—men, women, children, rich and poor sit in the Mercury theatre awaiting the art spectacle in shot 4. Powell is commenting that though there is auratic loss in art reproduction, there is also increasing equality in bringing art to the masses.
Shot 5 is a wide shot of the stage following the solo performance of Victoria Page on stage through a series of unobvious pans. The painted backdrop is of a blue moonlit lake at night, as Victoria dances light and gracefully onto the stage in a white swan costume.
The immediate cut from the crowd to Victoria’s solo entrance on stage indicates what the audience is watching. The careful framing keeps Victoria at the center throughout the entire shot. The contrast of the blue backdrop to her glowing white costume creates an aura about her—she is the object of beauty in our gaze (which is really the camera’s gaze). This nonetheless, supports the idea that Victoria alone is the art signifier. Benjamin argues that it is this creation of aura in the star of the movie that retains the auratic experience in art. Perhaps Powell is indicating to us that Victoria is a packaged art product meant to be shared with the masses, and that film is one way of effectively “packaging” aura. This idea that Victoria is merely an art product is also hinted at in shot 1 when the poster announces, “Reappearance of Victoria Page in Lac des Cygnes, for one performance only by special permission of “The Ballet Lermontov.” The production company, The Ballet Lermontov is the obvious patron of art—it owns Victoria as an art product—it has power over what she performs and who she performs for. Shot 5 is extremely significant not only in that Victoria is seen as the art product, but also the fact that we, the audience of the film, are forced to reflect on our own viewing of Victoria through the art product of film, a media of the masses. We realize that we are watching an audience watching Victoria—in other words, we are watching a reproduction of Swan Lake through a mechanical reproduction of film. It allows us to question, have we experienced doubly the auratic loss?
Shot five is significant in that we are viewing a reproduction of several different art forms. Peter Fraser writes in his Musical Mode: Putting on “The Red Shoes”, “Each mode demands a unique integration of intellectual and aesthetic sensibilities on the part of the viewer/listener. In her or his participations with a musical, the spectator participates on two entirely separate planes of metaphoric reality—the fictional and the lyrical. (Fraser, 45)” I agree that in this sequence of shots, we are experiencing multiple planes of “metaphoric reality”, but must add that in addition to story and music (as Fraser has mentioned), we are also experiencing visual reality of dance and the theatrical story of Swan Lake. With all these layers of superimposed reproductions, have we lost Walter Benjamin’s idea of aura in the process? I argue that in fact, we have gained a new kind of auratic experience through film. Though we are watching Victoria’s dances through a second media, this second media of film actually creates new aura from her performances. In the premiere of the Red Shoes ballet, the technology of film adds to the aura of Victoria as a dancer, so that her performance supercedes the stage and creates visual and auratic impact as film. The camera’s ability to capture each miniscule movement, the surrealistic shifts in landscape and imagery, filmic transitions, and transformative special effects does not merely makes a cheap copy a performance but extends and raises it into another dimension in our eyes. Similarly in shot 5, everything within the performance is constructed for film and not for the stage. Aura is created around Victoria in her costume, in the design of the set, and in the soft lighting of the shot, so that she literally glows. In addition, the shot is a continuous pan, following her every move, as if her performance was magnetic. These are auratic experiences created by film, and not solely the performance. Film enhances the viewership of a performance and therefore creates its own aura from its making.
Shot 6 is a medium shot of Victoria pirouetting across the stage as the music becomes increasingly sharp and dramatic.
Shot 7 is a reverse shot of what Victoria sees as she spins across the stage. The shot consists of several fast pans that imitate the spinning motion of the pirouettes while showing glimpses of the crowd observing.
These two shots function together as a shot reverse shot sequence. We instantly connect the idea that the fast pans are from Victoria’s perspective. We, the audience of the film are then sutured into the dancer’s mind, the dancer’s world—we see what they see, we experience what they experience. The end of this scene signifies the last time that we ever see the audience as a mass. From here on out, we see the story on the production side of things. We see everything from their training, to love lives, set design, music to choreography; we become sutured into their worlds. The absence of the audience in the final dramatic performances hints at the fact that we have replaced that imaginary audience in their role as spectators, that we are those missing masses—that we are the new proletariat. The significance of the audience’s suture into the production side serves to portray the economic problem in sustaining the high arts. From what we have seen with the change in technology, access to kitsch art is no longer a large problem. However, it is the sustainability of the “quality” of the “aura” in this art that is being addressed. Powell seems especially aware of this idea when he sutures the audience into the production. It is his way of showing us the difficulties of maintaining quality in “great art.” He shows us through the ultimate tragic ending that there is sacrifice involved in maintaining this high art, and that perhaps there is a compromise that must be made between quality of product, and equality of viewership.
The composition, mise-en-scene, movement, and cutting of this series of shots reflect on Walter Benjamin’s idea of the increasing mechanization of art as well as the suture of the audience into the production.
Works Cited
Benjamin, Walter. "The Storyteller: Reflections on the Works of Nikolai Leskov." Web. 4 Dec. 2009.
Benjamin, Walter. The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. Film Theory and Criticism. 7th ed. Vol. 1. New York: Oxford UP, 2009. Print.
Fraser, Peter. "The Musical Mode: Putting on "The Red Shoes"" JSTOR. Web. 4 Dec. 2009.
Goodwin, Craufurd D. "Roger Fry: Art and Commerce." Journal of Cultural Economics 22.1 (1998). SpringerLink, 02 Nov. 2004. Web. 4 Dec. 2009.
Greenberg, Clement. Avant-Garde and Kitsch. Art in theory, 1900-2000: an anthology of changing ideas. Google. Web. 4 Dec. 2009.
