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Risky moves: Freida Pinto (left) and Reece Ritchie.

Film review: Desert Dancer

It's hard to imagine life without dance. Yet the art form has been forbidden at times in various places such as the Oklahoma town of Elmore City, where it was banned for 100 years until 1980, which served as inspiration for the Kevin Bacon vehicle,

Yvonne Teh
DESERT DANCER
Starring:
Reece Ritchie, Freida Pinto
Director: Richard Raymond
Category: IIB

It's hard to imagine life without dance. Yet the art form has been forbidden at times in various places such as the Oklahoma town of Elmore City, where it was banned for 100 years until 1980, which served as inspiration for the Kevin Bacon vehicle,

Dancing has also been forbidden in Iran since the 1979 revolution. The Islamic republic is the setting of based on a true account of an Iranian who grew up with a passion for dance that would not die.

Early in his life, Afshin Ghaffarian (played as a child by Gabriel Senior and as a young adult by Reece Ritchie) knows there are ideological reasons behind some people's dislike of dance. But it's only after he goes to university in Tehran and establishes an underground dance company with, among others, fellow students Ardavan (Tom Cullen) and Sattar (Simon Kassianides) that Afshin realises dancing can be a political act.

National politics figures in , with the bulk of the drama taking place in the period leading up to the 2009 presidential election contested by, among others, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, a reformist politician who's also an artist and architect. And there's room for romance, too, by way of Afshin's attraction to Nadia (Freida Pinto), whose amazing dance abilities were nurtured by her former professional ballet dancer mother.

Ritchie and Pinto are not dance professionals but they mesmerise when performing moves choreographed by celebrated dancer-choreographer Akram Khan, especially in one scene that features Nadia showing the expressiveness of dance.

The drama takes liberties with aspects of Afshin's life, and was filmed in Morocco so as not to incur the wrath of the Iranian government. And while some dramatic scenes are clunky, still comes across as a creditable effort — especially in view of it being director Richard Raymond's first feature film.

 

 

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: Steps outside the law
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