''The White Crow'' is a 2018

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written by David Hare and directed by

Ralph Fiennes Ralph Nathaniel Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes ( ; born 22 December 1962) is an English actor, film producer, and director. A Shakespeare interpreter, he excelled onstage at the Royal National Theatre before having further success at the Royal Shak ...

. It chronicles the life and dance career of ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev, played by Oleg Ivenko. It is inspired by the book ''Rudolf Nureyev: The Life'' by Julie Kavanagh. The title is a reference to his childhood nickname of white crow (with a somewhat similar meaning to "black sheep" in English), because he was unusual. Principal photography was completed in October 2017. It premiered at the 2018

Telluride Film Festival The Telluride Film Festival (TFF) is a film festival held annually in Telluride, Colorado during Labor Day weekend (the first Monday in September). The 49th edition took place on September 2 -6, 2022. History First held on 30 August 1974, t ...

and the 2018 BFI London Film Festival. It also screened at the Tokyo International Film Festival, Cinemania (Bulgaria) and Febiofest (Czech Republic). Ralph Fiennes received the Special Achievement Award for Outstanding Artistic Contribution at the Tokyo International Film Festival, with the film receiving a Tokyo Grand Prix nomination. ''The White Crow'' was released on 22 March 2019 in the UK (StudioCanal) and on 26 April 2019 in the US (Sony Pictures Classics).

Plot

The film shuffles through three time periods: the present (1961) in Paris, his childhood, and the beginning of Nureyev's ballet career six years earlier. The present day in Paris: Rudi has travelled to Paris as part of the Kirov ballet company. During an arranged meeting, he befriends French dancers he read about in a magazine. During one of his dance performances, he befriends Clara Saint.

Cast

Reception

Critical response

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website

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reports a positive rating of based on reviews, with an average rating of . The website's critical consensus reads, "''The White Crow'' lacks the nimble grace of its subject, but as a reasonably diverting primer on a pivotal period in the life of a brilliant artist, it just about sticks the landing."

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, which assigns a weighted average rating to reviews, gives the film a normalized score of 54 out of 100, based on 8 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". ''The New York Times'' wrote, "''The White Crow'' is a portrait of the artist as a young man, an attempt to show the complex array of factors — biographical, psychological, social, political — that led to the moment when the 23-year-old dancer made a decision that would change the history of ballet: Nureyev became Nureyev by defecting from Russia to the West at Le Bourget airport in France in June 1961 ... Throughout

he film He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...

Fiennes and Hare suggest the extraordinary will and curiosity that drove Nureyev to dance, and to seek out art and culture wherever he could."

References

External links

''The White Crow''
at the

British Film Institute The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery (United Kingdom), National Lot ...

* * * 2018 films 2018 biographical drama films 2010s English-language films 2010s Russian-language films Films directed by Ralph Fiennes British biographical drama films Ballet films Films scored by Ilan Eshkeri Films set in 1938 Films set in the 1940s Films set in the 1950s Films set in 1955 Films set in the 1960s Films set in 1961 Films set in Paris Films set in Saint Petersburg Films set in Moscow Films set in Russia Films shot in Croatia Biographical films about dancers Cultural depictions of Russian men Cultural depictions of dancers Cultural depictions of classical musicians 2018 drama films 2018 multilingual films British multilingual films 2010s British films {{2010s-drama-film-stub