The sleeping beauty:classic motion picture with the kirov ballet 1969 dvd - Essay Example

Sleeping Beauty: The Kirov Ballet The protagonists of the film Princess Aurora, played by Alla Sizova, and the Prince Philip, Yuri Soloviev, played their parts both with extreme poise and due characteristics of the role they were assigned. Of course, since this was a ballet based on the classic fairytale of Sleeping Beauty, the visual effects and the music had a large role in furthering the ambience. The film is laid out as a musical should, but with the added elements of ballet props. The stage is decorated with pin-up props and still backgrounds that give very little room to maneuver the camera, which is evident in that the camera is mostly placed at the horizontal level of the stage itself, with occasional close-ups of the face in order to project the expression more clearly.

This technique allows the audience to focus on the ballet performance and together with the accompanying music the prevailing mood of the scene could be judged. The Tchaikovsky production is an elaborate transition of the original ballet piece into the world of classic films. Several techniques and effects which, of course, could not be utilized in the live performance were incorporated into this film without sacrificing the poise of the kirov ballet. One such technique was the use of transitional effects and superimposed scenes.

The fade-in sequence was evident in the first part of the movie where the fairies were introduced at the birthday party which Carabosse, the witch, shows up to uninvited. As the dances continue, the elaborated set is brought into view but its nature as a stage is a lot more evident than perhaps intended. This took a little away from realism, but exacerbated the fairy-tale nature of the ballet and perceivably gave more of a chance to the actual choreography to shine through. Indeed, the choreography of Carabosse complemented by the frequent close-ups during her sequences often purported to enhance her apparent evilness, which, along with the music, was virtually all the audience could use to decipher her characteristics.

Her costume, more akin to a fairy’s than a witch’s, was made to be black in order to ensure the audience did not mistake which side of good she was on. Thus, it seems that Sergeev made little use of background lighting, special effects, and props to project his ballet characters but together, they cast a bigger impact as a ballet performance than a film. The fairy tale nature of the story was made evident with the elaborate costumes of both female and male cast members. The visual effects he utilized frequented close-ups amidst dance sequences which not only brought to light the moods governing the scene but also gave a chance for the music to spike and dip in tune with the transition in order to project the right visual feeling.

This was sampled in scenes with Carabosse where the camera would often cut into a close-up of her face with a sudden spike in the music characteristic of evil scenes. In my opinion, Sergeev’s version of the ballet justified the original storyline with the little that he had to accommodate his motion picture at the time. The use of background set and other visual elements such as the use of props could have been more refined, but for a 60s production combined with the sheer brilliance of Alla Sizova and Yuri Soloviev (Sergeev), it had the right amount of visual appeal to be destined as a classic.

Works CitedSleeping Beauty. Dir. Sergeev, Dudko. Perf. Alla Sizova, Yuri Soloviev and Natalia Dudinskaya. Lenfilm Studios, 1964. Film.