De Plama's Swan

Over the weekend I saw "Black Swan."  It was pretty obvious that Portman is not a dancer, a year of study notwithstanding.  But that is not really a surprise.  What was a suprise was how little the movie was about or involved ballet.  There were a few scenes of class and rehearsal, and some of the purported opening performance.  None of that was of the portions that required real skill.  Which is fine - -there are not many actors with enough background to do a dance movie (Neve Campbell comes to mind, as she was a dancer, and so was at least one of the Tilleys).  What surprised me was that the ballet setting was not really any more than a backdrop to a psycho movie.  In fact, the movie was more Brian De Palma goes to the ballet -- the movie is about a woman suffering some serious psychiatriatic problems.  Porlematic that it is doubtful that anyone suffering such halluciantions could function well enough to be the prima and hold up over the months of rehearsal.  And like a good De Palma movie, the death is completely ridiculous -- no one could dance two acts of Swan Lake wth a hole in her stomach without bleeding all over the stage, least of all when one of the acts is in a white costum.  Black Swan is a better movie than Turning Point (Shirley McClain, for God's sake), but Turning Point is a bad movie with good dance.  This was a better movie with worse dance.