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I agree with this. Even if they were both in academic probation for the same reason, they don't really need to have the same meeting. I could see if they were failing as part of a group project but they are roommates.

omg if you're confusing popping and locking do you even belong in a dance academy?!?!?!?! It's like confusing bournonville and cecchetti methods of ballet!!!!!!

Did anyone else feel like it was wildly inappropriate for both Ruby and Jazzy to be sent to Madam Markova’s office together? Their infractions, such as they were, were completely unrelated. Jazzy was suffering from chronic tardiness due to sexy-fierce, forty-year-old dude fucking, and Ruby wasn’t, what, popping when she should be locking? I get Madam Markova was busy, but damn, it really felt to me like this might be a situation where two separate meetings might have been in order.

I know we’re dealing with movie logic here, but straight up, if I was in a truly devastating situation, one that might end in any permutation of destitution, homelessness, and deportation, and some person I barely know came to me with “you should probably enter this contest” as a solution, I would lose my damn mind. Homeland Security is about to bust down my door and my hunky ass back to Britain any second, so bring me realistic options or get the fuck out.

Here's just a genuine question about dance academies in general. How much dancing does a dance student do a day? I don't know what a full course load would be like but Ruby is doing at least contemporary and ballet in one day. That's a couple hours of aerobic exercise a day. Are students doing much more than that a day? 1. That sounds truly exhausting but I'm also lazy. 2. How much showering do students do a day? They change outfits for each class and presumably aren't changing into clean clothes after getting sweaty in an earlier class. So, I'd think they shower after every class unless they go sweaty and gross to every class.

That was insane! It’s like Paul said in the episode, every time the hint of conflict arises, it is immediately squelched. I thought for sure when the instrument loaner dude asked for her ID, he was going to at least say, “Your ID says you’re in the dance program...” I mean, when you think about it, the movie is just one big false stake. He think he’s going to be deported because he’s overextended his visa. All of his decisions and subsequent scenes are based on this. Then, at the end, it turns out nobody gives a shit. It’s bonkers. I would have loved if he had to fight through DHS or whatever just to make it to the competition.

I just want to say my thoughts and feelings are going out to that poor violin student at the conservatory that is in desperate need of a violin. Unfortunately they can't play and are almost going to get kicked out of the school as a result. They are in on a scholarship and the airline company lost their violin. They're not sure if they'll ever get it back and can't afford to buy a new one. Fortunately they heard the school lends out music instruments to their students. Unfortunately they lent out the last violin to a dance student who doesn't even know the difference between a viola and a violin for an indeterminate amount of time without asking a single question. Now Johnny is going to get this poor student's free scholarship and they're going to be forced to go back to toil in obscurity in Toledo as their talent and skills slowly fade away and die.

What strikes me odd about your idea is that at first I was like "why not have a few in the music part of the school" but then I remembered the kids are practicing in rooms right next to the rooms the kids dance in. You're mixing them together. Why not have a wing of the school dedicated to music and another to dance. That way you can have a few cheeky snacks in those vending machines in the music wing, while keeping the less fun stuff in the dance wing. Also a dance student that wanted to be bad would have to go all the way across the school just to get to those snacks and they would have no reason for being over there except for a kitkat run. This would shame them and thus force them to stick to their healthy snack machines.

Yes! She was doing the same moves as the hip hop dance crew but in a not as fluid way. She was still very straight and precise which seemed more in line with modern ballet then contemporary style. She still seemed "stiff" which is what the crew and Jane Seymore didn't want her to be and were trying to get her not to be but they all praised her. Maybe contemporary dance is simply a fancy term for "modern ballet."

Also I want to ask one more question, what's the age range? It seems on one hand post-secondary because they are going out drinking, but yet they have kids their practicing music. Do those kids have tutors their for their regular schooling?

It kind of pissed me off that the school vending machines only provided fat-free options. What kind of fascist bullshit is that? I mean, if it were only a dance school, I could maybe get it, but I’m sure there are, like, ten-year-old French horn players who might appreciate Kit Kat break every now and again - especially after being bawled out by whatever sadistic taskmaster they’ve been saddled with for accidentally releasing their spit valve in the middle of Bizet’s L’Arlesienne Suite No 1. A bag of cheddar flavored kale chips isn’t going to do shit to alleviate that kind of academic stress.

Looking at my letterboxd entries, some movies of note (some filtered out because they've already been mentioned) 2010 (It looks like I haven't seen that many movies from 2010) Meek's Cutoff Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives Certified Copy Poetry Winter's Bone Greenberg (which I particularly love) The first four are all legitimately solid films of dramatic or artistic note (in the dramatic sense, if that makes sense). Winter's Bone was a really well made neo-noir. Greenberg, I already mentioned. I just like movies about unlikable people being unlikable in a way that seems painfully true to life (and being unforgiving) 2011 The Big Serious Movies: Melancholia (I think this is the Lars von Trier movie, of the ones that I've seen that works best for me. Dogville also maybe. ) Tree of Life (which I didn't jive with mentally, but that might have just been my mental state while viewing) The Turin Horse (which might be too minimalist, dialogue-wise, for some people, but all that wind was pretty audacious) A Separation (which I thought was good. I think other people at the time liked it more than me. Granted, I don't live in Iran, so the should I stay or should I go dilemma wasn't as pronounced. Maybe it'll become more relevant for the US in the years to come). Contagion (outbreak procedural from Soderberg who always does good movies for me, but never best movies of the year for me) (Out of those, the two I could see myself revisiting are Melancholia and The Turin Horse) -------- Fun or good genre movies from 2011 Cabin in the Woods Kill List Manborg (you can watch the trailer for this and get an idea of what this one is like. It is goofy.) Killer Joe (Friedkin has a late career mini-resurgence. Just don't expect The Exorcist or The French Connection here. This is a small movie). ----- Smaller indie films Take Shelter Martha Marcy May Marlene The Color Wheel And I wrote down Alps, but like The Killing of Sacred Deer, was a Lanthimous film I didn't really connect to. So, 2010 looks like the more ambitious movies turned out better for me, but the surrounding movies of 2011 were more successful. Though the two big ones from 2011 (Melancholia and The Turin Horse) were comparably very memorable in terms of experience.

I find it odd that she says she's never done contemporary. If she's a dancer in today's world it's kind of impossible for her to NEVER have taken Contemporary classes. How did she get in this school with nothing but ballet? Yes she's a ballet dancer ( and a very good one at that) but many ballet dancers now take several kinds of dance and Contemporary is one of the main ones. She would have probably started dancing at a young age and should have had at least a few years under her belt. Also some of the criticisms of her problems in the Contemporary class I could remember had to do with her lines and angles. Ballet is all about the lines of the body and the angles. Those aspects of Contemporary would have been the most similar to ballet I would think? Also I thought that the big dance finale would have her using contemporary style. But I don't think she did anything but ballet. She might have done more modern ballet but that was ballet as far as I could tell.

Flavor Flav... The original 9/11 conspiracist.

So does the school want Ruby to fail? She's clearly a trained and skilled ballet dancer and I assume that's what got her the scholarship. However, she admits in the first contemporary class that she has zero experience with contemporary dance. The first day at the school she's told there is no dress code for contemporary dance and she asks what she should wear. Instead of getting a straight answer from the head teacher she gets "Use your imagination." How is that helpful? She doesn't do that kind of dancing and you know that because you just read her bio. What is the harm in saying something helpful? Then she's called out in the first class and after the second class. She has zero experience and you're trying to pull the "It's because she has so much potential." Bullshit. She's had two days and you're already threatening to kick her out even though she promises to start getting better. If you really thought she had potential you would give her actual instruction rather than berate her after her first attempt. Then what? A week goes by and you are threatening to end her scholarship because she's not showing enough improvement in something she literally just started? Maybe wait until the end of the first term or something. Fuck you dance conservatory.

I agree with this. In fact I wish they had filmed the dance scenes better because I might have enjoyed the movie more. I hated this movie and was mostly incredibly bored by it so when the dance scenes started I thought "Finally some fun." Nope they went and ruined those as well. Part of what makes a dancer incredible is seeing them move. It's about what they're doing with their bodies. You don't need close ups of the face let me see their bodies move! While on the topic of horribly shot dance scenes, who was live streaming the subway dance battle? Were they just standing between the groups filming and how were they live editing it as well?

Original bad boy of violinning.

I was surprised the hosts (yup, still calling them hosts) didn’t comment on the conversation the judges have during the middle of Johnny and Ruby’s performance. The female judge calls it “completely indulgent” and one of the other judges says “I disagree. Don’t we want to evolve? Don’t we want to progress?” I have so many questions about this conversation like - Is what they are doing really all that progressive? - If the female judge had such a negative attitude toward the performance, how did they end up winning? - And perhaps, most importantly, is this supposed to be the main lesson of this movie - to be more accepting of non-traditional expressions of art? That works better if the movie was centered around the school trying to stop Johnny from playing the style of music he wanted, but Johnny’s not a student and the school seems to fully embrace contemporary forms of dance and music. That conversation was as pointless as the subplot involving Johnny’s violin being stolen, which added no dramatic tension to the movie.

I am 100% with you on this. When I was watching the movie I thought they must have been trying to set two specific records. One being make a feature length film with the shortest script ever and the second being include the most orbiting camera shots of any movie ever made. I also throw in my support for my fellow inflexible brethren. The movie was missing one small piece of writing which was what the hell was Johnnie Blackwell's motivation for being in the US? He was clearly desperate to be in "New York" to the point of paying $5K that he couldn't spare but I have no idea why. The top of the movie should have included a deep fake of David Cameron giving a fiery speech that he would end the scourge of violin players in the London Underground and then I'd have been on board.

So "crematiing your pointes" is a thing. Pointe shoes can be worn through REALLY quickly. It's a way to keep your shoes going longer and stay stiff. I don't know if I've ever heard of the term in my reading on the history of ballet, but according to a dancer wear blog I found one way to do this is "Some dancers also use this method to revitalize dead shoes: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Swirl a floor polish like Mop and Glow inside the pointe shoes, the pour out the excess. Place the shoes on a baking sheet covered in foil, and place them in the oven. Turn the oven off, and let the shoes sit in the oven 8 hours or overnight. The polish will re-harden the box and shank of the shoes, but it stains the satin a yellowish color and makes them super stiff. This method is not exact, and it will take experimenting to find the perfect amount of polish. Practice this method on an old pair of shoes you don't need before you try it with the pair you are wearing. " http://thedancewearguru.blogspot.com/2014/10/how-to-make-pointe-shoes-last-longer.html I found a lot of recommendations to use Jet Glue which I think is pointe shoe glue? I also saw on a dance forum that some recommended putting shoes in the freezer for a brief fix. Or to use shellac http://www.dance.net/topic/8757237/1/Pointe-Beginners/Rehardening-pointe-shoes.html&replies=1

So are we gonna talk about how this old violin is magically an electric violin at times?

I haven't listened to the episode yet , in fact I just started the movie. I paused it after 2 minutes because I NEED to talk about how insane it is that Brit Boy is playing violin shirtless.( Sorry if this is discussed! I'm in a full tiz!) Some people get these sort of chafed red marks on their neck and sometimes throat / collar bone area. They are known as "violin hickeys" or "Fiddlers Neck". In fact when selling a rare Stradivari violin only people who had a "violin hickey" could try the instrument at Christies auction house . Some people get really painful cysts and lesions that can get infected. Not everyone who plays gets one though. There's been a theory that some people are allergic to the woods I the violin or the metals while others think it's the playing style. According to Wikipedia the cause of this can be ( I'm only going to be putting the important info to prove my case) " ....Hot weather is reported to exacerbate fiddler's neck, as are tiredness, playing emotional music, and playing in smaller groups where individual stress is higher.[2] Type I hypersensitivity reactions may also be involved, particularly to rosewood and ebony in the chinrest and tailpiece, as well as to varnish of the instrument body when chinrests are not used and to rosin deposits on the instrument and on chin cloths. " So technically Brit Boy ( I refuse to give him a name) said that he burns with his music. Maybe it's just really hot in that million dollar loft? Hence playing shirtless? And he sure as hell wasn't using a chin cloth. He seems under the impression his music is deep and full of *emotions* ... In conclusion this idiot is gonna get Fiddler's Neck all over his damn shoulder if he doesn't put a shirt on.

According to Wikipedia, John Blackwell was the name of Prince's drummer, as well as a 19th-century Welsh poet, and a 19th-century English civil engineer. Any of these would've made for a more interesting and compelling love interest than illegal immigrant Edward Cullen. In fact, I would love it if the sequel was about Ruby falling in love with any of these Johnny Blackwells.

I am sad I didn’t get to see this live since I am in NYC. Stupid family. I sort of want to know what June would think of CENTER STAGE now. If Paul is flexible now, what does that mean for June’s anti-male flexibility/splits movement?

I was truly flabbergasted that Jazzy's downfall never paid off, especially after falling in love with the mysterious, bad boy known as Paolo. 1. When Jazzy started showing up late for class after meeting her new man... I immediately thought, "Okay, here comes her addiction to pain medication that Paolo introduced her too." = Nope 2. Oh... Jazzy is warned to be safe on Paolo's motorcycle... "here comes the late night accident that will sideline her for a long time." = Nope 3. Jazzy is too tired in the morning and can't get out bed.... "Here we go! She. Is. Pregnant!" = Nope And another thing, "fuck you Jazzy" for not wanting to get out of bed towards the end of the movie. The headmistress LITERALLY told you the day before that you have no more chances of fucking up. You should have made your full character turn at that moment. Why isn't Jazzy waking up Ruby; which would bring a nice turn in their relationship.