I saw this, "Ballettens Datter," literally translated as "Daughter of the Ballet" and also known by the English title "Unjustly Accused," on the final day of this year's online version of the Pordenone Silent Film Festival. As with the other films shown, this one began with a promotional video of the archive responsible for restoring the film, in this case the Danish Film Institute, and it's the best of the bunch, not only because it gives an overview of the restoration process, including the reinserting of color tinting and toning, as with this print, but also because the archive has committed to digitizing their collection online for free. Dozens are already available on their website, with hundreds more promised to come, including, I assume, this one. Thirty-eight European film archives, overall, have been also leading the way in this regard on the European Film Gateway website, for which, by the way, there is a clip of "Ballettens Datter" available and which demonstrates in its jittery faded quality the work that went into restoring it, as the picture streamed for Pordenone was pristine.
Back when I first surveyed early Danish feature films, I was limited to the DVD collection, which at the time was also impressive compared to other archives, that the Film Institute had released, and seeing "Ballettens Datter" years after that initial endeavor, I'm afraid I may've been overly harsh in my reviews. Perhaps, I'll return to those titles again someday, but, as I recall, many of them are similar to "Ballettens Datter" in several ways. The aspect that may be jarring to today's eyes are that these earliest feature-length films tend not to feature innovations in camera movement or editing, the focus being on a tableau style of mise-en-scène. Indeed, the camera in this one is stationary besides two shots on boats, and many scenes are comprised of only one shot, including a couple jump cuts. Some interesting things, as in other early Danish films, are done in front of the camera, though, including mirror motifs that sometimes show action that would otherwise be out of frame, and there are often some innovative lighting tricks, including the silhouette composition at the end of this one. The blocking for the tableaux can be interesting, too. Here, for instance, the film begins with windowed doors being opened to reveal character emerging to the middle from the background, and it ends with curtains being moved in the foreground to reveal another character in the background. There's also a brief three-way split-screen shot of a telephone conversation. Thus, even though there isn't much in the way of camera movement and editing to quicken the pace, there's quite a bit of movement within each framing to keep the spectator's eyes darting.
These films also tend to be melodramatic, but what I appreciate is that they're also often reflexive in their focus on performance, whether it be the circus, theatre, dance, or film itself. In one scene, the Count imagines the ballerina (played by professional dancer, as well as film actress, Rita Sacchetto) in superimposed motion over a newspaper and as a mise-en-abyme, sort of cinematic equivalent of a comic thought bubble, over his room's wall. There are also a few play-within-play scenes of her stage performances, the first of which features her as Pierrot, although nothing very interesting is done with the gender-bending, or otherwise suggestively androgynous or homosexual, possibilities of Sacchetto performing in a traditionally male-gendered role and that being the source of the Count's obsession to possess her as his wife. After these initial performances, the gendering and dress in the rest of the picture could hardly be more normative and of its time. The obsession to possess her for himself, however, is a fruitful take on the interaction of performer and spectator as akin to romantic and sexual seduction. He falls in love through this voyeurism, including purchasing a bunch of postcards of her, but equates a monogamous marriage commitment from her with the demand that she abandon the stage forever. When the inevitable drama of her restoration to the theatre occurs, the Count treats it as sexual infidelity. Performance as infidelity extends, as well, to her wearing of a mask in her final performance, and the masquerade even extends to the business with the pills for the duel as performative. While within a few years and the emergence of classical continuity editing, "Ballettens Datter" would soon appear dated technically, it is a fine work of the aesthetics of its era, , and while its marriage mores may seem old fashioned, the treatment of performance and the male gaze seems ahead of its time.
Back when I first surveyed early Danish feature films, I was limited to the DVD collection, which at the time was also impressive compared to other archives, that the Film Institute had released, and seeing "Ballettens Datter" years after that initial endeavor, I'm afraid I may've been overly harsh in my reviews. Perhaps, I'll return to those titles again someday, but, as I recall, many of them are similar to "Ballettens Datter" in several ways. The aspect that may be jarring to today's eyes are that these earliest feature-length films tend not to feature innovations in camera movement or editing, the focus being on a tableau style of mise-en-scène. Indeed, the camera in this one is stationary besides two shots on boats, and many scenes are comprised of only one shot, including a couple jump cuts. Some interesting things, as in other early Danish films, are done in front of the camera, though, including mirror motifs that sometimes show action that would otherwise be out of frame, and there are often some innovative lighting tricks, including the silhouette composition at the end of this one. The blocking for the tableaux can be interesting, too. Here, for instance, the film begins with windowed doors being opened to reveal character emerging to the middle from the background, and it ends with curtains being moved in the foreground to reveal another character in the background. There's also a brief three-way split-screen shot of a telephone conversation. Thus, even though there isn't much in the way of camera movement and editing to quicken the pace, there's quite a bit of movement within each framing to keep the spectator's eyes darting.
These films also tend to be melodramatic, but what I appreciate is that they're also often reflexive in their focus on performance, whether it be the circus, theatre, dance, or film itself. In one scene, the Count imagines the ballerina (played by professional dancer, as well as film actress, Rita Sacchetto) in superimposed motion over a newspaper and as a mise-en-abyme, sort of cinematic equivalent of a comic thought bubble, over his room's wall. There are also a few play-within-play scenes of her stage performances, the first of which features her as Pierrot, although nothing very interesting is done with the gender-bending, or otherwise suggestively androgynous or homosexual, possibilities of Sacchetto performing in a traditionally male-gendered role and that being the source of the Count's obsession to possess her as his wife. After these initial performances, the gendering and dress in the rest of the picture could hardly be more normative and of its time. The obsession to possess her for himself, however, is a fruitful take on the interaction of performer and spectator as akin to romantic and sexual seduction. He falls in love through this voyeurism, including purchasing a bunch of postcards of her, but equates a monogamous marriage commitment from her with the demand that she abandon the stage forever. When the inevitable drama of her restoration to the theatre occurs, the Count treats it as sexual infidelity. Performance as infidelity extends, as well, to her wearing of a mask in her final performance, and the masquerade even extends to the business with the pills for the duel as performative. While within a few years and the emergence of classical continuity editing, "Ballettens Datter" would soon appear dated technically, it is a fine work of the aesthetics of its era, , and while its marriage mores may seem old fashioned, the treatment of performance and the male gaze seems ahead of its time.
