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" What really matters is that 'Black Swan' deploys and exaggerates all the cliches of earlier ballet movies, especially 'The Red Shoes,' another tale of a ballerina driven mad and suicidal. "

Robert Gottlieb

Matters

Movies

Black

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" Gelsey Kirkland has had more than her share of demons, as her two distressing memoirs - and her violently checkered career - attest. "

Robert Gottlieb

Two

Demons

" The heart of the classical repertory is the Tchaikovsky-Petipa 'Sleeping Beauty,' and no ballet is harder to get right. "

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Robert Gottlieb

Always

Him

" What 'War and Peace' is to the novel and 'Hamlet' is to the theater, Swan Lake' is to ballet - that is, the name which to many people stands for and sums up an art form. "