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Preservation funding provided by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, The Film Foundation and the Louis B. Mayer Foundation
The Red Shoes
U.K., 1948
The UCLA Film & Television Archive’s glorious restoration of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s The Red Shoes made its spectacular debut at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival. Overseen by legendary UCLA preservationist Robert Gitt, the restoration employed traditional chemical and cutting-edge digital processes, eliminated years' worth of damage and returned The Red Shoes to prominence as a masterpiece of world cinema that has inspired cineastes, lovers of dance and filmmakers ranging from Vincente Minnelli to Stanley Donen to Martin Scorsese, for generations. We are thrilled to reprise this perennial favorite again as the closing film in our 2021 reopening program. Powell and Pressburger's cinematic marvel tells the story of a beautiful, immensely talented ballerina (Moira Shearer) in a world-class ballet company, her growing love for a young composer (Marius Goring), and the Svengali-like impresario (Anton Walbrook) whose utter commitment to the ballet brings the young lovers to a terrifying emotional precipice. Around this trio swirl a magnificent cast (including many famous dancers), astounding production design, music and choreography, a shockingly sumptuous color palette and a revolutionary treatment of dance on film. Utterly original in style and thematics, The Red Shoes audaciously insists, as Powell has said, that art is "worth dying for" in its portrayal of the warring passions that are both sublimated and ignited on the creation of beauty.
35mm, color, 136 min. Director: Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger. Based on an original screenplay by Emeric Pressburger. Screenwriter: Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger. With: Anton Walbrook, Marius Goring, Moira Shearer.
Restored by the UCLA Film & Television Archive in association with the British Film Institute, The Film Foundation, ITV Global Entertainment, Ltd. and Janus Films.
