Let Them Dance

More people should watch the 1980’s spy/ballet thriller “White Nights” (despite the unfortunate name.) I don’t know why it’s not up in the ranks of perennial slumber party fare like “Dirty Dancing” and “Labyrinth” are.

It stars Mikhail Baryshnikov, Gregory Hines, and the first performance of Isabella Rossellini. 

Possibly because the plot is bad and any scene that does not involve dancing is bad. But fortunately most scenes involve dancing. Here’s the thing: I don’t even like watching dancing. Neither ballet nor tap (which are the specialties of the two leads.) But it’s clear that the director (Taylor Hackford) cares about it, and so that is the element that gets his attention.

The video above is just the opening credits of the movie. And Mikhail fortunately is a good actor whenever the matter is tangential to dancing. (Gregory and Isabella are of course always good actors.)

The plot itself works better was a “two people one room” scenario (ie what “Two Popes” wanted to be.) A star ballerino from Leningrad defected to the US for the twin reasons of sentimental conservatism (“I’m Russian, not Soviet”) and being able to earn more money. He crashes and is stuck back in Russia. The KGB sets as his minder a black tap dancer who defected from the US after the Vietnam War. They argue about their birth country’s respective history of oppression and how they treat different types of artists and class. They do this via dance sequences. It is moving and excellent.

It's not that the ballet (and tap and other) is just pretty fan service. It's that it is an effective way to tell the story, and worth appreciating in that right.

Notable scenes are: Hines tap dancing an explanation of structural racism in Harlem, Mikhail dancing the tragedy of suppressed artists and work under a politically restrictive regime, and the two of them doing a duet together that is very well coordinated and not in the preferred dance style of either of them.

Any rigmarole involving the straight from central casting KGB Colonel is cliche and predictable (except for the one scene where for no reason he dances by himself.) The scenes with American spymasters who want to get Mikhail out but are afraid to act are similarly pointless. But like, so what? Fast forward until you get to more dancing.

I particularly applauded how the director took the typical action-scenes of the spy escaping from his prison and doing death-defying hijinx and… made them look like ballet as well, leaping from I-beam to I-beam or performing aerial silk tricks on the rope.

The movie takes a very meta twist in the second half. To cover up what they are really talking about, to set their KGB minders at ease, and to extract some concessions, Mikhail and Gregory start arguing a lot about Isabella (who is playing Gregory’s wife and interpreter.) Mikhail is pretending to be racist and says it is disgusting for Isabella to be with a black man, and wants her for himself. They record a number of conversations to play for the eavesdroppers, all with the active participation of all three of them.

Except they get really, really into this performance. They record far more argumentative dialogue than is necessary. Mikhail and the Colonel exchange crude slurs (content warning: n-word.) It just goes on and on. And well, they are performers, and there is a lot to say about performers and the mask becoming real.

So my favorite moment, is while the tape of them having this derogatory argument in the background is playing, Mikhail and Isabella have crossed a rope to the fire escape, and Gregory is supposed to join them, but he instead just *throws away the rope* and goes downstairs to the KGB office to cover their escape. 

They do, in the end, choose to all go to America, instead of rejecting *both* oppressive regimes. Which is unfortunate but unsurprising.

Check it out from amazon, and fast forward through the non-dancing parts.