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DARLING

Dir. Birgitte Staermose, 2017 | 103 minutes

Darling is the moving love story of a dancer on the rollercoaster ride of her life, a drama about the rise and fall of a courageous woman facing life-altering circumstances. A world-famous Danish ballerina, Darling and her husband Frans return to the Royal Danish Ballet in Copenhagen to perform the classic ballet "Giselle," where she will dance the title role with Frans as choreographer. During a rehearsal, however, Darling collapses, and the prognosis is dire: her hip is irreparably damaged. Her professional life in ruins, she decides to train a young ballerina named Polly to make her into the Giselle she can no longer be. But as Polly becomes the centre of attention, especially of Frans' attention, Darling must face the greatest trial of her life, both professional and personal.

English sub-titles. Mature content.

“Despite some clear parallels in tone and plot, Darling stops short of replicating the full-spectrum hallucinatory mania of Black Swan. Staermose’s film is ultimately a more conventional portrait of artistic obsession, a deluxe soap opera with a disappointingly sensible conclusion that speaks more to cool-headed Scandinavian values than to the overcooked conventions of melodrama.”
- Hollywood Reporter