The Red Shoes (Powell & Pressburger, 1948)
My Winter Movies # 8
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Trivia
- The 15 min (approx) Ballet of the Red Shoes used a corps de ballet of 53 dancers.
- The Red Shoes wasn’t at all understood by the distributors at first. It was only after an independent US distributor showed it for an unbroken 110 week run in an off Broadway theater (The Bijou) that Universal realised that it was a worthwhile film after all. Universal took over the US distribution in 1951.
- When people complained to Michael Powell about the gory ending, he pointed out that in the original Hans Christian Andersen story the girl had her feet hacked off with a woodsman’s axe to stop her dancing.
- Designer Hein Heckroth once asked some children which part they liked best in the original Hans Christian Andersen story. «When they cut off her feet» they all replied. «But we couldn’t do that in the film,» said Hein, «Moira would not like it».
- The script for The Red Shoes was originally written by Emeric Pressburger in 1937 (for £2,000) for Alexander Korda who planned to use it as a vehicle for his (intended) wife Merle Oberon. It was planned that the dancing scenes be doubled by a professional dancer. Powell and Pressburger bought back the rights from Korda for £12,000 in 1947.
- An entrant in Variety’s «Golden Fifty» list of the top money makers of all time. (More here)
