Karel Reisz’s Isadora shuffles back and forth across decades of Isadora Duncan’s (Vanessa Redgrave) life, making its transitions either by well-deployed intellectual montage or else by the relative simplicity of a clever match cut. The film begins with a rarity, a scene that unfolds before the usual introductory studio logo, in which the young Isadora pledges to stay true to her muse and remain unwed, all the while setting fire to her parents’ wedding certificate. The segment’s unique placement here sets it off as particularly important to the film’s conception of Isadora’s character. Though the film frames the famous dancer’s life through her relationships with three very different men (one of whom she does, in fact, marry), it leaves us with the distinct impression that Isadora never subsumed her own identity in these affairs. Thus, the film dovetails nicely with both the emerging second-wave feminism and the burgeoning counterculture of the late 1960s.
The film proper opens on the French Riviera in 1927, where Isadora, nearing 50, is busy dictating her memoirs to her personal secretary, Roger (John Fraser), with the assistance of longtime friend Mary (Cynthia Harris). (Although the film doesn’t mention the fact, Mary Desti was the mother of one Preston Sturges.) Frequently intercut with these sequences are depictions of Isadora’s growing infatuation with a young man she nicknames “Bugatti” (Vladimir Leskovar) after his jaunty sports car. Over the course of the film’s progressively darkening second half, Isadora’s pursuit of the young man becomes a sort of allegory for her chasing her own destiny. And as anyone familiar with her biography will anticipate, getting into the man’s sports car will be the last thing that Isadora ever does.
Each of the three relationships the film delves into serve to open up different facets of Isadora’s personality to the audience. Scenic designer Gordon Craig (James Fox) is another artistic free spirit, as intent to break from hidebound convention in staging the drama as Isadora is in her dancing. Their scenes together are among the most warm and romantic of the whole film. Sewing machine heir Paris Singer (Jason Robards) offers Isadora a lavish lifestyle, buying her outright a school where she can teach dance, but at the cost of being counted as another among his possessions. The film illustrates their vastly different conceptions of propriety through the witty expedient of a croquet game. Lastly, there’s Russian poet Sergei Esenin (Zvonimir Crnko), whom the resolutely revolutionary Isadora meets when she’s invited to live and work under the new Soviet regime in the early 1920s.
Scenes that compare Isadora’s time in Russia with the couple’s reception upon their arrival in New York are among the film’s most pointedly political. Reisz doesn’t stint when it comes to showing Isadora’s disenchantment with the realities of life under the Soviet system. But the film does offer one stirring scene where Isadora dances in front of a large gathering, until the power goes out, when singers in the crowd literally rise to the occasion with a folk tune. It’s a poignant, if a bit stereotypical, illustration of art overcoming differences and uniting people. In sharp contrast stands Isadora’s performance for a hoity-toity New York audience, who heckle her and walk out on her brazen antics, while outside the theater Gospel Billy (John Brandon) denounces the “Godless Red invasion.” These events contribute to the gradual darkening of the film, culminating in its tragic denouement.
Image/Sound
Kino’s HD transfer of Isadora isn’t being touted as any sort of restoration, which probably explains the intermittent speckling on display, as well as several instances where a few frames seem to be missing, resulting in inadvertent jump cuts. Otherwise, the visual presentation is quite strong, with lots of clarity and fine detail evident in the period costumes and décor. The color palette is rather muted overall, except for occasional bursts of bright red, which appear deeply saturated. Grain levels are well-handled and flesh tones look appropriately lifelike. The Master Audio stereo track is clean and clear, and does very well by Maurice Jarre’s lovely score, which often quotes from a number of different classical pieces.
Extras
The major extra here is a commentary track from filmmaker Allan Arkush and filmmaker/historian Daniel Kremer. Sometimes it’s a bit of a contest between the two to see whose information will get conveyed first, but all things considered, it’s an extremely listenable and information-packed track. The commentators tackle the various cuts of Karel Reisz’s film, its structure and use of flashback, compare it with other “musical” biopics of the time like Star! and Darling Lili, and discuss the film’s alterations to the actual biography of Isadora Duncan. There’s also lots of interesting, albeit technical, discussion about the use of long lenses, zoom lenses, and the film’s editing techniques.
Overall
Making its Blu-ray debut with this Kino Lorber release, Karel Reisz’s exceptional biopic cleverly avoids most of the pitfalls of the genre.
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