As those who have read Li Cunxin’s widely-praised autobiography will know, Mao’s Last Dancer tells the inspirational story of a young peasant boy who is taken away from his family during the heart of the Chinese Cultural Revolution and is forced to train at the Beijing Dance Academy.
Li, played by Chi Cao as an adult, ultimately grows up to become a passionate and world renowned ballet dancer, albeit one who causes a minor international incident in 1981 after refusing to leave the United States and return to China. While this dramatic tale may shine in the sphere of non-fiction, it barely even glimmers in the cinematic realm.
Director Bruce Beresford (Tender Mercies, Driving Miss Daisy) and writer Jane Sardi (Shine, The Notebook) mishandle the material, rendering the remarkable aspects simply ho-hum, and many aspects of the film ends up amateurish. One walks away from the movie feeling underwhelmed, as if it could have been something amazing — the story just had so much potential — and yet somehow, the film ended up barely even mediocre. Barring a few notable exceptions, Mao’s Last Dancer falls completely flat.
Much of the movie is comprised of a parallel storyline, portraying Li’s life as he begins to experience capitalist American culture while flashing back to his earlier life in China. We see the boy being chosen for a prestigious art program by the Chinese government, learning to live a life separate from his family and struggling to master simplest aspects of ballet.
The audience easily sympathizes with Li as he is ordered to leave home and everything he has ever known merely because some Chinese government officials decided that his body type was right for the art.
While not spectacular, these early scenes are enjoyable as Li makes new friends, takes on mentors and slowly begins to understand the love for this art he had been forced into.
However, it’s when the camera jumps away from the grey skies in China back to the vibrant city of Houston that many of the film’s weaknesses are exposed.
The dialogue is stilted, the acting sub-par, and the plot is poorly constructed — utterly predictable. The characters are especially shoddily written. They lack depth and oftentimes their motivations are completely lost on the audience.
The romantic storyline between Li and fellow ballet student Elizabeth Mackey (Amanda Schull) is particularly perplexing, as neither the actors nor the characters they portray have any chemistry whatsoever and seem to be bewildered as to what they are doing together. The romance is clumsily managed to point where it’s almost boring, which is in itself a disappointment as it’s an integral element to the dramatic international incident that takes place later in the film.
That being said, however, the dance scenes in this film are exquisite. Chi Cao, the Birmingham Royal Ballet principal dancer who portrays Li throughout the entire movie, is nearly indescribable in his graceful athleticism and even those who are ignorant in the nuances of ballet are aware that they are watching a master.
Each performance is well-suited to the current tone in the film and the extended ballet scenes definitely add to the plot of the story rather than interrupt it, as is often the case in movies of this nature. It is apparent that the film took risks in including such drawn-out sequences and these risks do pay off in the most spectacular of ways.
Unfortunately, this is the only element in which any risks are taken in Mao’s Last Dancer. The story itself is rife with political tensions — not only did Li grow up during the tumultuous Chinese Cultural Revolution, but the international incident that takes place in the climax of the film is highly controversial, a diplomatic tug-of-war.
Yet Beresford and Sardi play it safe, falling back on overused clichés and shallow stereotypes. Everything is black and white; disco dancing is fun while ballet boot camp is deathly; only in America can Li find the passion and freedom to dance or, as he puts it, to fly; the American host is affable and trust-worthy while the Chinese consulate is severe and manipulative; capitalism good, communism bad. While these views are not necessarily disagreeable, it would have been nice to see a little more confliction in the character of Li as he struggles to follow the Chinese ideals that have been drummed into his him since birth, rather than him arriving in Texas and immediately finding all of America “fantastic.”
On the whole, this film isn’t completely hopeless. There are points where the dialogue can draw forth a chuckle (a small confusion over “six” as opposed to “sex” is particularly endearing.)
The cinematography isn’t anything to write home about but there are certain frames that are, quite simply, witty — such as when Li first spots Mackey and the camera catches a poster for the comic ballet The Lady and the Fool looming over his right shoulder — and also inspiring, such as the ending shot.
Cao himself is a refreshingly understated and consistently affecting actor even though this is his acting debut. In fact, Cao is probably the strongest aspect of this well-intentioned movie. When he is on the screen, spinning and leaping across the stage, the film soars.
The audience feels for his character as Li slowly begins to discover his love for an art form he had been forced to embrace, and is captivated by his tremendous skill and passion as he finally discovers what it feels like to fly.
As for the film as a whole, well — while it doesn’t actually manage to take flight, there are elements that deserve their merit and ultimately, Mao’s Last Dancer is at least able to hover admirably above the ground.
