BRATTLEBORO — A film by an award-winning documentary filmmaker from Canada, Elise Swerhone, TuTuMUCH chronicles one intense summer in the lives of budding ballet dancers, girls (and a very few boys) who are chosen for the Royal Winnipeg Ballet's summer program.
At the end of the summer, a select few dancers will be invited to attend the Royal Winnipeg Ballet's professional school and the opportunity to dance with the company.
One of the preeminent schools for young ballerinas, the school is all you'd imagine. Its teachers are tough taskmasters, teachers who seem to carry their lives in dance like royal garb but who also make sure there is a healthy allotment of fun for their young charges.
One of the Women's Film Festival selection committee's favorite offerings this year, the film offers wonderful sequences of the classes, where we get to watch the essence of grace and poise that is ballet as it unfolds in these young bodies. We also see the hard work and the very specific aesthetic standards that make ballet a world unto itself.
The filmmakers give equal time to a half-dozen or so students, presenting intimate glimpses into what it means on a personal level to be a part of this exacting, exciting world.
The film provides a view into what it takes to become a Margot Fonteyn or Gelsey Kirkland, including the good fortune to be born with the “right” body type.
You don't need to be an enthusiastic ballet fan to enjoy this film. Any more than you had to be one to enjoy Billy Elliot. Each young lady has her story, and we get to know and appreciate their individuality, their personalities, in a way that is completely non-exploitative.
Maybe the freshness of the film is because it comes to us from Canada; there's a good chance there would be more posing, more competitiveness in the United States. There's some but not a whole lot on display here.
What we do get are girls who range from pre-teens to mid-teens who are guileless, smart, and silly. But they are amazingly mature when it comes to the art they love - ballet.
TuTuMUCH provides a candid look at the intense and rigorous world of the budding ballerina. But it also captures the magic, the reach for the sublime which has drawn girls to this art form for centuries.
And from the look of it, its hold on girls' imaginations is as powerful as ever.