Only When I Dance
- Posted: 26th Mar 2010
- Category: Reviews
Ballet is tough: it’s hard on your body, it’s ridiculously competitive, and to get to the top is one of the hardest professional climbs in the world. If you add to that the fact that you’re from a favela in Rio de Janeiro and the odds stacked against you verge on impossible.
Beadie Finzi’s beautifully shot documentary follows two promising young dancers who are in precisely that situation. Irlan is a young man of exceptional promise: his technique is admired by all who see him dance, but to win a scholarship he must pass his high school diploma - not an easy achievement when your classmates won’t even observe silence for the final exam.
Isabela, his classmate at Rio’s best dance school, has even more stacked against her: she’s trying to get to a major dance competition in New York but her family are resorting to loan sharks in order to pay for her flights, accommodation and expenses and she’s been told that her skin is too dark and she’s carrying too much weight.
‘Competition docs’ have abounded in recent years: the format of a group of people trying for the ultimate achievement in one form or another is a proven winner with audiences, to the point that every other documentary now seems to follow it. And for viewers used to the X Factor-style emotional manipulation of each competitor’s back story it’s easy to become cynical.
Only When I Dance promises something different, however: these are real obstacles and in Isabela’s case a lot more rides on success than a sense of personal achievement. To this extent, it’s her story that provides the most jeopardy and empathy, which is a shame because the film focuses much more on her classmate. Irlan’s story is pretty much over in any dramatic sense by halfway through the film, although his loving, sparkly parents provide an absorbing sub-plot. His dad, particularly, captures hearts as he admits that from feeling worried about the macho factor in his son’s choice of career, he’s become his number one fan.
Isabela’s attempts to overcome the multiple obstacles of poverty, skin colour and body shape are harrowing. At one point she tells the doctor that she can’t strap her injured foot, because it’s too close to the New York competition and she has to rehearse, and we know she’s right. We’ve just seen how her family are exhausting every avenue to find the money to send her, and she probably can’t afford a second chance. It’s at these points that the film really seems to be pushing the narrative beyond a standard competition format and I could have seen much, much more of her.
Still, watching fantastic dancers is never dull, and the film has plenty to carry an audience’s attention through to the end.
Director: Beadie Finzi, UK/ France 2009, 78 mins