Strangely enough, I can recall the first time I witnessed an Irish jig. It was during my middle school talent show. Three girls dressed as porcelain dolls -- complete with curly-cue wigs, enameled frocks, and ersatz smiles -- high-stepped around the stage, spines stiff and arms limp at their sides. Bag pipes blared, and by the time this strange hybrid between tap dance and beauty queen pageantry was over, there was collective pubescent confusion pervading the auditorium. The Shirley Temple look-alikes bowed and exited through the wings.
In Jig, the latest documentary from director Sue Bourne, the self-contained world of Irish Step Dance is on full display. Bourne has selected a pool of female talent (and even a few males) ranging in age from a veteran of ten years to last-chance contestants of nineteen as they undergo grueling physical and psychological preparation for their respective shots at the 40th Irish Dancing World Championships held in Glasgow, Scotland.
Dresses run $2,500. Ten-year olds break legs. And a dancer's earnings are tallied in prestige.
Self-aware parents attempt to comprehend the compulsory spending. A single-parent mother remortgages her home (twice). A Silicon Valley-based doctor leaves a lucrative practice for his son's preeminent U.K. training. And the financial sacrifices continue to pile on -- some would say in service of paternal affection, others would suggest more pernicious motivations. However, the private lives of Jig's subjects mostly remain dormant, overshadowed by the competition itself.
Jig is eerily reminiscent of Jeffrey Blitz's Spellbound (2003), which similarly chronicled the 1999 National Spelling Bee contestants in the run-up to and during the two-day competition. Bourne populates the film with too many characters, varied in age and personal narratives. Fifteen-year old Joe Bitter is so naturally gifted that winning isn't the ultimate goal but whether he can deliver the "perfect" routine. Whereas ten-year old John Whitehurst, bullied at school by communal jeers of "gay", often has difficulty retaining the order of his steps, despite his talent. Contextualizing so many personalities leaves less of an impact. It's an effort to demonstrate the international and cross-cultural appeal of this unique form of dance. Over ninety minutes, faces return but their convictions are loosely sketched, spread too thin.
Achieving dramatic bliss in its So You Think You Can Dance finale, Jig pits two ten-year-old female competitors against each other -- Long Islander Julia O' Rourke and Northern Ireland native Brogan McCay. Is it a so-called class battle between the pampered private-lesson American and community center Irishwoman? Perhaps that's a bit much. In the end, though, Jig draws on sports movie conventions and winsomely entertains.
