A Dancer's World (1957 TV Movie) User Reviews

Modern Dance Sixty Years Ago

[boblipton · 6/10 · 21 January 2019]

This half-hour TV special aired sixty years ago. Agnes Demille appears briefly, then speaks in voice-over as a troupe of a dozen dancers perform in a rehearsal studio; she then returns, talking about how dancers are examples of the "divine normal." Apparently, if you work really hard, you can perform in groups of four.

It's a joyless celebration of beauty, and Miss Demille is a lecturing, stern schoolmarm with a weird-looking giant hairpin drawing the viewer's attention, whose message is....

Well, I'm not sure. the dancing is very good, the camerawork byPeter Glushanok is beautifully composed and the editing by Eleanor Hamerow keeps the dancers in view, with enough variety to avoid boredom. I can only conclude that Miss Demille was possessed of a great talent which she could not explain in English.

In a way, this oddball film is before its time . . .

[cricket30 · 7/10 · 23 January 2019]

. . . yet by many standards it also sticks out as a relic of America's past, like a gangrenous sore thumb. Though the ditzy narrator of A DANCER'S WORLD prattles on and on about a lot of self-help memes, she fails to demonstrate any of the exercises being promoted by this apparent workout video herself. Of course, since A DANCER'S WORLD came out before VHS tapes were even invented, the basic rules for helping those of us at home to "feel the burn" probably were yet to be codified. A DANCER'S WORLD also deviates from what became standard cardio fare with its obvious lack of diversity. Not one of the seven female demonstrators featured here is a "plus size" by any stretch of the imagination, and "mosquito bites" might be the most charitable descriptor for their glandular "achievements." The lady doing all the talking throughout A DANCER'S WORLD adopts an increasingly garish costume between her minions' home exercise snippets, seemingly designed to make movement impossible. And the "action" interludes themselves look as if they've been filmed in old "Tom Edison's" 'Black Mariah' studio. They're in black & white on an unadorned set, backed only by some tinkling on a "Tin Pan Alley" piano.

The title says it all

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 17 August 2015]

This is a half-hour documentary about dancing. It stars famous dancer Martha Graham, who co-wrote this and who shares admittedly very basic information about dancing. Most of the time we see people actually performing, usually ballet-like sequences. Graham was in her early 60s when she made this and went on to live for another 35 years and there are more people in here who either died at a very old age or are still alive at a pretty old age today such as Yuriko. The documentary is in black-and-white and has some nice music and movements. I found it pretty calming and soothing to watch. Yet, I cannot see any real aspect that would make me more interested in the world of dance or in Martha GrahamÄs life after watching. And I also don't think, it is a film that will have any new information for experienced dancers. Not a bad movie, but not really educational either I must say.

The Dance As Art

[ACarringford · 22 January 2019]

If you have a chance to see this short documentary you should do so. Agnes De Mille is considered one of the masters and innovators of American choreography. Primarily devoted to ballet, she is also known as a choreographer in musical theater, beginning with Oklahoma in 1943 and more than a dozen other Broadway shows including, Carousel, Brigadoon, Paint Your Wagon, so when she tries to explain a dancer's world to us, we are wise to listen.

She is seen preparing her makeup and costume for a performance and with this beginning she explains the role of preparation in the creation of art. She is already 63 years old by this time so she is not really going out to dance, but she looks good enough that she might have. She is primarily trying to make the case that ballet truly is an art. Her point is that art requires tremendous preparation and discipline but that sufficient preparation and discipline leads to "freedom" because the personality finally merges with the art.

She ends with a quotation from Saint-John Perse, the winner of the 1960 Noble Prize for Literature, that, "(art is) the privilege of the instant, but you have so little time to be born to the instant."

This takes place against the backdrop of her dancers performing in a practice studio and the dancers drive the point home by being disciplined, graceful and sublime. I thought it was inspirational.