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MovieMail's Review
Karel Reisz's vivid portrayal of the brilliant, troubled life and career of the iconic free-style dancer, Isadora Duncan. Redgrave deserved an Oscar for her performance, says Julian Upton.
Extravagant and daring, Isadora is a biopic very like its subject, the ‘Earth Mother of modern dance’, whose unrestrained approach to her art and her life delighted and scandalised early 20th century Europe in equal measure.
In an Oscar-worthy performance (she lost to Barbra Streisand for Funny Girl), Vanessa Redgrave captures Isadora Duncan’s physicality and free-spiritedness with admirable gusto; she trained for six months to perfect the dancer’s playful style, but equally as impressive is the boldness of her characterisation.
Director Karel Reisz supplants the reverent chronology of the ‘prestigious’ costume biopic with a flashback approach punctuated with lyrical flourishes of Duncan strutting her stuff, sans shoes and draped in the billowing, semi-transparent tunics that became her trademark. But the story of Isadora is as tragic as it is inspirational, and, by focusing on her doomed relationships with a theatre designer (James Fox), a sewing machine heir (Jason Robards) and a volatile Russian poet (Ivan Tchenko), Reisz and screenwriters Melvyn Bragg and Clive Exton assemble a vivid, sensitive portrayal of a brilliant but troubled life and career.
Isadora Duncan was the most iconic free-style dancer of the 20th century, and a woman who courted both admiration and scandal in equal measure. Her unique style of dancing made her the guests of nobility and revolutionaries alike, ultimately making her the ‘peoples’ dancer’. But her Bohemian lifestyle and unorthodox morality led to a personal life that was marred by misunderstanding, tragedy and ultimately her own untimely death.
This Oscar-nominated film stars Vanessa Redgrave in a stunning portrayal of Isadora Duncan and was adapted for the screen by Melvyn Bragg.
Isadora burns her parents' marriage license as a little girl and pledges her life to ‘Beauty and Art’. Whilst her genius for dance and free spirit causes a sensation across Europe, her naive, effervescent radiance leads to an almost accidental succession of lovers. As she sips champagne and dictates her memoirs at the Negresco Hotel in Nice, Isadora reflects upon a life and art that were anything but conventional. Jason Robards, James Fox and Ivan Tchenko co-star.
