Review by Spencer Gordon
Photo provided by Mao’s Last Dancer
Mao’s Last Dancer
Directed By Bruce Beresford
Starring Chi Cao, Bruce Greenwood, and Kyle MacLachlan
Rated PG for a brief violent image, some sensuality, language, and incidental smoking
Bruce Beresford (Driving Miss Daisy, Double Jeopardy) is known for making inspiring and emotional movies that do a great job at storytelling. But for some reason, his latest effort, Mao’s Last Dancer, seems to be a step back for the acclaimed director and feels a lot like a clone of last year’s surprise hit The Blind Side. Last year Blind Side was nominated for an undeserved Best Picture Oscar and earned Sandra Bullock a much-undeserved Oscar for lead actress; Dancer seems to be trying to replicate the success of Blind Side with very similar storytelling and filmmaking techniques.
Dancer tells the story of Li (Cao), a Chinese ballet dancer who was plucked from his village as an eleven-year-old and then forced to focus only on learning ballet for the rest of his life. After the usual “You are never going to make it” speeches from his instructors, Li works extra hard and eventually earns a trip to perform in America. Under the hospitality and teaching of the very effeminate Ben Stevenson (Greenwood), Li becomes a star and soon doesn’t want to leave America. This causes a massive international relations issue between China and America that causes him to seek out a lawyer played by MacLachlan.
The movie is based off of the memoirs of the real Li and stays pretty true to his incredible tale. Yet all films need talented artists to recreate the magic of the true story and unfortunately Dancer just didn’t have them. The cinematographers weren’t very experienced; it felt they were trying too hard to be artistic by using weird angles and curious tracking shots. Greenwood, perhaps best known as Captain Pike in the recent Star Trek, delivers a very stereotypical performance of a gay man by acting distractingly effeminate. MacLachlan, on the other hand, portrays Charles the lawyer with little to almost no emotion that made me feel no sympathy for his character as he tried to help Li. To be fair, first time actor Cao as Li delivers a solid performance, yet the situations the script put him in didn’t let him showcase his talent as much as possible.
For any dance fans or art appreciators, this film does a great job in delivering solid dance sequences and beautiful visuals. It’s undeniable that a dance movie needs to show good dance sequences, and the ballet performances in Dancer are beautiful and filmed very well.
I truly feel that I could have liked this movie if I wasn’t a film nerd, but being one makes it hard to enjoy a type of film that has been made numerous times before. From The Blind Side and Remember The Titans to way back with Rocky, these types of melodramas come out way too often but always touch the hearts of Oscar nominators. If you are a fan of the genre then this movie will probably entertain you, but this film critic is ducking out of the dance early.
Grade: C for being predictable, ordinary, and touching the hearts of naïve audiences everywhere.
Like what you read? See what other films Spencer has reviewed.
