Dance aficionados will be sent over the moon by this compelling documentary from director Bertrand Norman, chronicling what it takes to be a prima ballerina in the Mariinski Theatre.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | May 1, 2009

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 1, 2009

As dazzling as they can be in performance, the ballerinas are even more breathtaking when a camera catches them alone in the shadows, dancing only for themselves.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Apr 30, 2009

The movie is an admirable look into the venerable St. Petersburg company and how dancers thrive or just survive in the physically challenging world of dance.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Mar 27, 2009

A jewel of a documentary.

| Mar 13, 2009

Such a brief glimpse into these women's lives and art whets the appetite for more; alas, Ballerina ends far too quickly, leaving only their willowy shadows behind.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Feb 26, 2009

Ballerina will be of interest mostly to balletomanes, but even folks who don't know their right foot from their left will find inspiration in the lives of these devoted dancers. Besides, who isn't moved by Swan Lake?

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jan 16, 2009

If only a glimpse, the privilege compensates: one wants more from Ballerina because the world it reveals -- elegant and harsh, glamorous and grinding, classical and obsolete -- proves so rich in exquisite contradictions.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jan 16, 2009

Watching these women perform is a striking lesson in ballet's rigorous aesthetic alchemy -- and the extreme, exquisite individualism that prevails.

| Jan 14, 2009

Ballerina has the feel of a propaganda puff piece put out by the Russian tourist board.

| Original Score: 1/6 | Jan 14, 2009

A close-up but still, one senses, heavily idealized documentary portrait.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Jan 14, 2009