POLINA – Review

(l-r) Niels Schneider and Anastasia Shevtsova as dance students in POLINA. Photo courtesy of Oscilloscope Films ©

The French and Russian languages drama POLINA is a coming-of-age story about a promising young Russian ballerina named Polina in search of artistic fulfillment. But POLINA’s real appeal is not its story but its many moments of beautifully photographed dance and fine choreography.

Renowned French choreographer Angelin Preljocaj has worked on several documentaries but this is her first narrative film drama. She co-directs with screenwriter Valerie Muller, who adapted the story from a graphic novel.

Fans of both classical ballet and modern dance will find much to enjoy in this film, in part because the dance sequences are not little snippets used to season the story, but a major (and delightful) part of the film’s running time. Preljocaj’s often electrifying choreography is reason enough to see this film but the film also features the wonderful Juliette Binoche and handsome French-Canadian actor Niels Schneider.

This is a story of a little Russian girl growing into a dancer, and then into an artist with her own adult ambitions, making it an artistic coming-of-age. Polina is played by Veronika Zhovnytska as a young girl, and by Anastasia Shevtsova as a teenager. Polina is a hard-working, talented girl but she is also very lucky in many ways. Her working-class parents are supportive of her dancing and encouraging as she struggles with her classical ballet training. They are thrilled when their daughter has a shot at the legendary Bolshoi dance company, an iconic cultural treasure to the Russian people.

But a chance viewing of a modern dance performance fires the teenager’s imagination, and an attraction to fellow dance student Adrien (Niels Schneider) leads her to France, where she meets modern dance innovator Liria Elsaj (Juliette Binoche). In France, things do not go as smoothly for the classically-trained Polina as she had hoped. She ends up Antwerp on her own, where things get very rocky for young Polina. Luckily, she meets handsome French choreographer (Jeremie Belingard), and things begin to improve.

While the dance sequences are delightful, the familiar story is less so. The story is structured into three acts but the plot is often falls back on familiar types and tropes. Further, we never really get into Polina’s head, or experience her inner life.

Shevtsova has a delicate beauty and is a professional dancer, clearly a gifted one. While she does well enough with the acting, she shines much more in the dance bits. Actors Binoche and Schneider carry the heavier acting load but also do their own dancing, and a light touch in the editing lets us see that. The scenes later in the film, where Shevtsova and Belingard work on improvising some choreography in the streets and then a studio, are particularly magical.

Dancing energizes this film more than story, and cinematographer Georges Lachaptois captures some striking images to frame it. POLINA is interesting exploration of the making of a dancer and a visual treat, particularly for fans of dance.