Luna de miel

Before the restoration it was like a travelogue with a few dance sequences.

Now that it's been restored (by Charles Doble) it is like a totally different film. Much better balanced than in previously seen versions where much of the story & the ballets were cut leaving it as little more than a travelogue. The flamenco between Antonio (I) and Carmen Rojas is the sexiest dancing I've ever seen on screen.

However, it does still show the lack of Emeric Pressburger. There are plot holes here & there and nobody can work out why Anthony Steel is there.

But do try to see it, preferably on the big screen (CinemaScope) that it was made for and makes good use of.

If you applaud Michael Powell's tendency towards kitsch, you'll love this over- the-top, Technicolor travelogue, in which grinning Anthony Steel consistently chooses Pepsi over wine, Antonio dementedly dances down real dust-caked country roads, and in very unreal gypsy caves, and nobody really believes in the plot, except as an excuse for another ravishingly photographed Spanish location, or a garishly produced mini-ballet. Antonio's acting is of the flouncing artiste school - but it's in perfect keeping with this whole joyful, zesty farrago of colour and movement, which should be seen in its original Technirama format.

This film could be subtitled Actors in search of a Story. Since essentially there isn't one. Just a sequence of dance numbers with no interest for anyone who isn't interested in Spain and/or dance.

Powell managed to limp on after Peeping Tom nearly destroyed his career,but his subsequent films were unremarkable.

This film has some good colour photography,but this in itself is not sufficient compensation for watching this film,which is akin to watching grass grow.

I would not have bothered to have sat through this film were it not for the fact that it was directed by Michael Powell.

I did in fact meet Powell when he was working for Frixos Constantine.

Enjoyable film very moving in its style with a superb Flamenco soundtrack and unique photography style . This is a ¨Road movie¨ in which the starring couple travel through several Spanish locations , showing a real sightseeing of the marvellous cities and villages . It deals with Australian Kit Kelly (Anthony Steel) and his new bride Anna (Ludmilla Tchérina) are driving through Galicia , Spain , when they help Antonio who was abandoned by a friend and while he is dancing down the road to Sarasate's "Zapateado" rythm . They then discover he is a famous Spanish dancer , and subsequently Antonio learning that Anna was a ballerina earlier she wedded , and Antonio attempts to persuade her to join his company . Along the way they travelogue across a number of Spanish towns as Santiago De Compostela , Madrid , Teruel , Toledo , Cordoba , Granada , among others . Finally , they meet again when he is representing ¨Amantes de Teruel¨dance spectacle . Here is the color and excitement of Spain...alive with the frenzy of the flamenco and the fires of a chaming love !

Quintaessential Dance film features brilliant and frenetic choreography and embellished thanks to its chromatic aesthetic and a high-caliber Flamenco score , adding sensual re-creations of love , passion , betrayal , and jealousy . The dazzling and devastating dancing set new standards for this splendid musical film in this wildly successful and classical musical of the late Fifities . It is essentially a ballet , that's why it is musically riveting , it is almost, also, perfect and laced with glimmer photography , particularly shown on the spectacular Alhambra De Granada when Ludmilla Tchérina and Antonio dance a sensitive dancing set piece . The glamorous representation: Manuel Falla's "El Amor Brujo¨ or ¨Bewitched Love¨ is the highlighting of the movie , including glorious acting of Léonide Massine and Antonio , it concerns a woman is cursed by a bewitched love and every night she goes to the place where his old lover died to dance with his ghost . This story based on the ancient tradition of promising children to marry each other has love, passion, betrayal, death, lust and redemption . Set on an elaborate stage representation of an Andalusian shanty location- at gypsy caves- in which a lot of dancers dancing splendidly . It is also enhanced by additional songs in the Andalusian style performed by some characters in the movie . Atractive soundtrack conducting Sir Thomas Beecham and Mikis Theodorakis's theme song , Honeymoon , in the film sung by Marino Marine was a classic music , in Spanish as : ¨Nunca sabré¨ sung by notorious singers as Gloria Lasso , Karina , Paloma San Basilio , Albert Hammond and was covered by The Beatles in 1963 as part of their "Pop Go The Beatles" series for BBC radio . Being well starred by Ludmilla Tchérina who formerly performed classic musicals : Red Shoes , The Tales of Hoffmann and in Spain also acted in Parsifal , while the seducer wooden Anthony Steel is miscast . And standing out the fabulous dancer Antonio considered to be one of the greatest Flamenco dancers of all time.

Special mention for the colorful cinematography by George Perinal in CinemaScope , Technicolor , Techniscope . The motion picture financed by powerful producer Cesáreo González and Michael Powell himself , being written by the prestigious Luis Escobar and compellingly made by Michel Powell , and it obtained some prizes as Cannes Film Festival 1959 Winner Technical Grand Prize and Nominee Palme d'Or : Michael Powell. This was one of the best British filmmakers , Michael started working at various jobs in the English studios of Denham and Pinewood on a series of quota quickies . Later on , he made all kinds of genres with penchant for Dramas , Musical and WWII films . As he directed : The tales of Hoffman , The red shoes , The elusive Pimpernel , Pursuit of Graf Spee , The small black room , Black narcisus , Contraband , The thief of Bagdad , Edge of the world , I know where I am going , Night ambush , The lion has wings , Spy in black , The forty-ninth parallel , One of our aircrafts is missing, Life and death of Colonel Blimp , Canterbury tale . Many of them are considered masterpieces, and being produced under banner his production company : The Archers , along with Emeric Pressburger . Powell was rediscovered in the late 1960s and early 70s by Martín Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola . In fact , Powell worked as Senior in Coppola's Zoetrope Studios and he married Scorsese's longtime editor Thelma Schoonmaker. He died of cancer in 1990 . Rating : 8.5/10 . This riveting movie is especially appointed to serious people and fonds about music, dance, and romance , this shouldn't be missed.

I have to start this review with a caveat. I mentioned this in a comment on the Statement of Purpose, but I could not find an English language version or English subtitles. I bought the Region-B Blu-ray in the hope that the known menu trick (pressing the Disc Menu button when the Region incompatibility screen comes up, it works on my Region-B edition of The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes) would work, and it doesn't. I even looked for the script! I found nothing except a surprisingly detailed plot summary on Wikipedia. So, armed with my previously held knowledge of two romance languages (French and Italian, both of which I'm coincidentally trying to beef up at the moment for unrelated reasons) and that summary, I decided that I would do my best. And you know what? I think it was enough.

For I enjoyed this film. I really did. It helps that the movie has rather long stretches that are dialogue free, Powell essentially trying to recreate his artistic and commercial success of The Red Shoes but with flamenco in Spain. That may seem dismissive of the effort, but the overall plot mechanics (which I divined from the summary, mostly) are extremely similar at a character level while there's a long ballet sequence that focuses in on the central female character's mental breakdown. I mean, it's pretty close. I think I would actually like the film a bit more if I were able to get that Region-B Blu-ray to work and I could make out more of the dialogue, but even with my handicap, I think it worked.

So, anyway, Kit (Anthony Steel) and his newlywed wife Anna (Ludmilla Tcherina) are honeymooning in Spain before they head to Australia. He's a sheep farmer, and she's a world-famous ballerina who has given it up for him. One thing I could not get without a more detailed English translation or more knowledge of Spanish is the reasons for this. I have to accept it on faith that the reasons are good enough, and considering the obvious influence on the film in general is dance like ballet, simple reasons and big emotions are going to be good enough. I'm fine with it.

They come across Antonio (playing himself, effectively) after he's been driven off by his woman and dancing partner, Rosita (Rosita Segovia), and he is obviously attracted to Anna, though he doesn't figure out who she is until she decides to visit his dance studio later and makes it obvious with her ballet-inspired recommendations for his production of The Lovers of Teruel. Then we get the love triangle that mirrors that of the three leads in The Red Shoes. Antonio wants Anna to dance, though this iteration is obviously more directly sensual than what we saw in the previous film (flamenco is inherently more sensual and borderline erotic than ballet), while Kit wants Anna to love him as she had promised to (though he's more insistent on her not dancing at all, which isn't quite what happened in The Red Shoes).

So, the rest of the film is a movement back and forth as Kit and Anna travel through Spain with Antonio happening upon them. Kit has to go see about some bulls, so Anna and Antonio end up dancing around a disused mosque with Antonio showing her the art and architecture wordlessly through ballet. It's inherently unrealistic and sometimes seems overly awkward, but the whole thing is two dancers coming together through a mutual love of the physical art, so having Antonio show her around like that may seem silly by sight but works inherently at the same time. Once you get past Antonio's arch moves, it's actually kind of a sweet scene. Kit, of course, suspects more than just Anna dancing, the rift grows between them, but it never descends into melodrama in the speaking parts.

No, that's saved for the ballet!

The final act of the film is essentially two ballet performances. The first is performed within the film as an actual performance, that of Bewitched Love that Kit and Anna watch as spectators. The second happens in Anna's head when she's suddenly stricken with a fever, and she imagines herself and the two men as the principles in The Lovers of Teruel. It's all dance, and the dance is very good.

And so, the overall picture ends up feeling like a ballet of sorts. The emotions were never complicated. It was a well-worn plot that ended in a comfortable spot and had some pretty sights along the way. It's not at the level of The Red Shoes, but it's got some wonderful vistas of Spain, some looks at some churches and mosques, includes a lingering series of shots on the painting "The Burial of the Count of Orgaz", and the dancing is very good and filmed cleanly. There's some real panache in the visual representation of the ballets, in particular the climax of Bewitched Love, and everyone is fine in their roles (which, again, I might have been able to better appreciate if I could have understood more than 1 out of every 4 or 5 words).

So, it's mostly lost and forgotten. It's incredibly difficult to find. However, I was swept away with it by the end. It's not great cinema, but it's a small confection of dance-based film that looks good while it plays. I couldn't ask for much more from a travelogue of Spain.