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Blog by Don Kennedy

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Mao's Last Dancer

Mao's Last Dancer stars Birmingham Royal Ballet principal Chi Cao who makes a smooth cross over to film playing the adult subject adapted from Li Cunxin best selling autobiography. A child of Mao’s Cultural Revolution Cunxin was taken from his peasant family to study ballet at the Beijing Dance Academy. For being able to artistically portray Maoist ideology he became an unlikely star in his own country and then went on to make  international headlines by refusing to come home after a three month stay in America as a guest of the artistic director of the Houston Ballet. Vancouver’s Bruce Greenwood is subtly effeminate at the ballet impresario Ben Stevenson in that watershed of culture known as Texas. The consequences of Cunxin’s actions not only placed in peril his extended family in China headed by his mother Niang (Joan Chen) but also proved to be almost as painful as the brutal conditions that he left behind both on the commune as well as at the strict academy. You know you’re being manipulated but it’s impossible not to get emotionally involved with this film. Mao's Last Dancer is a thrilling spectacle for ballet enthusiasts and a biopic with fascination for students of history.

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