'We Had All Been Told for 10 Years to Go Out and Die for Freedom and Democracy - Now That the War Was Over, the Red Shoes Told Us to Go and Die for Art' As a Beautifully Restored Print of Powell and Pressburger's Classic Film the Red Shoes Hits the Silver Screen, Alan Morrison Uncovers the Incredible Art, Creativity and Obsession Behind the Greatest British Movie Ever Made .

Sunday Herald › December 11, 2009

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Summary

MARTIN Scorsese knows a thing or two about movies, so when he calls The Red Shoes "truly the most beautiful Technicolor film ever made", there's no point arguing. Earlier this year Scorsese travelled to the Cannes Film Festival to introduce the world premiere of a lovingly restored print, which is about to go on selected release across the UK courtesy of Glasgow-based film distributor Park Circus; but this wasn't the first time he had put his weight behind an attempt to push The Red Shoes further into the spotlight. In the mid1990s, he contributed a commentary to an American laserdisc edition of the fi lm and, between autumn 2006 and spring 2009, kept a watchful eye on the restoration project in his role as founder and chair of non-profi t organisation The Film Foundation.

Over the years, several film-makers have championed this wonderful creation by the legendary production partnership of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. In Scorsese's case, he has a personal connection to the film - his long-time editor is Thelma Schoonmaker Powell, widow of The Red Shoes' director. Every time he opens his mouth about it, however, it's the movie fan inside him, not the fi lm industry bigwig, who speaks the loudest. For Scorsese, the key to the film lies in a conversation between up-and-coming ballerina Victoria Page (Moira Shearer, above and right) and ballet company master Boris Lermontov (Anton Walbrook), in which he quizzes her about her dedication to her profession.

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Extract

'We Had All Been Told for 10 Years to Go Out and Die for Freedom and Democracy - Now That the War Was Over, the Red Shoes Told Us to Go and Die for Art' As a Beautifully Restored Print of Powell and Pressburger's Classic Film the Red Shoes Hits the Silver Screen, Alan Morrison Uncovers the Incredible Art, Creativity and Obsession Behind the Greatest British Movie Ever Made .

"Why do you want to dance?" he asks. "Why do you want to live?" she replies.

"Over the years, I've thought a lot about that exchange, " Scorsese says. "It expresses so much about the burning need for art, and I identified with that feeling the very first time I saw the picture with my father. I was so young then. It put me in contact with something in myself, a driving emotion I saw in the characters up there on the screen, and in the colour, the rhythm, the sense of beauty - in the film-making."

Shot in 1947 by director Powell and screenwriter Pressburger's company The Archers and released the following year, The Red Shoes is a ...

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