The American

Joy Womack goes to Moscow at fifteen. She has been accepted at the Bolshoi academy and is the only American in the class. On the first day she sees that the method here is different: the teachers speak harshly, injury is not an excuse, and the students watch one another. She does not speak Russian. Her toes bleed. Her teacher Volkova does not like her and will not let her go either. Years pass and Joy becomes the first American to graduate from the academy. Then she wants to join the company, and there is another order there. James Napier Robertson writes and directs. Talia Ryder plays Joy and Diane Kruger her teacher Volkova; Oleg Ivenko is in the cast. It is a New Zealand and Polish co-production; the film's other title is Joika. Its ground is real; Joy Womack was the first American to graduate from the Bolshoi academy and the nickname was given to her by one of her teachers. The matter it treats is how much it costs; the film does not present the discipline as a virtue. The narrative shows the injuries and the questions about eating in the ballet world directly. The teacher Diane Kruger plays is its most contested figure; she is cruel and the narrative does not judge her easily. Talia Ryder performed some of the dancing herself. The narrative also touches on how the institution works in Russia and the company section opens another conflict. Its limit is structure; the narrative runs to type, the secondary characters are thin, and the ending is rushed. Who it is for: viewers who like ballet films and drama drawn from real stories. Who it is not for: it is conventional, hard, and the ending unresolved.