Dark Feathers: Dance of the Geisha review

Dark Feathers: Dance of the Geisha has an interesting premise with capable direction that’s undone by a confusing and baffling script.

The film starts off when Kate (star/writer/co-director Crystal J. Huang) is accosted by an ex-flame desperate to reunite now that his wife has left him. When Kate refuses a reconciliation, the guy threatens to leap off the roof to his death. Kate being nonplussed is somewhat understandable, but it’s not a good sign for Dark Feathers when no one else reacts to a guy jumping off a building in the middle of the day.

At least a pair of police officers are reasonably concerned and start investigating Kate’s potential involvement in this death. And as luck would have it, one of the officers — Remy (Gilles Marini, Sex and the City) — has an inside track on learning more about Kate. Remy’s wife, Amelia (Karina Smirnoff, Dancing with the Stars), is Kate’s instructor at her ballroom dancing studio.

Turns out Kate has somewhat of a cloudy past. Her dance and romantic partners have a nasty habit of suddenly dying on her. Is it simply a matter of really rotten luck and a ton of coincidences or somewhat far more sinister? Remy is on the case to find out.

Dark Feathers has a subtle plot, which somehow involves Michael Madsen (Donnie Brasco) as a samurai boss, suggests Kate is killing these men for a larger, criminal purpose. Or maybe the reason she’s pulling off these assassinations is to regain custody of her daughter? And in between contracts, Kate is attempting a ballroom dancing trophy while doing some casual photography on the side. That’s a pretty wild and inspired mash-up of ideas. It’s certainly not the norm for a film where the tango is so prominently featured.

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Huang wrote the story crafted by screenwriters Jin Yao and Daniel Benton that sells the notion that Kate is some black widow character luring potential partners into her web and bed only for them to ultimately get killed. That could work if they actually spent any time explaining why Kate is so undesirable to everyone she encounters. It’s especially baffling in the case of Remy, who seems to have a much more dynamic and vivacious spouse in Amelia.

Kate’s character required Huang to go full vamp mode — think Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct — to truly be such an undeniable force. Huang plays Kate too reserved to be such a temptress. Dark Feathers probably would have benefited by being somewhat salacious. There’s little by way of steamy scenes. Huang and co-director Nicholas Ryan are almost bashful in simply suggesting Kate’s lesbian encounters as if having some sort of second-hand embarrassed the story takes that turn in some hopes of titillation.

Marini is solid in the secondary lead role as he gives Remy some measure of believability as he considers his surging curiosity with Kate without jeopardizing his marriage. Again, the script is a letdown here not giving character arcs their proper development in a satisfying manner.

Huang, who also has experience as a dancer, stages those ballroom dance scenes with a grace and elegance making for film highlights. Generally, Huang and Ryan have a strong sense of the best perspectives to shoot scenes even if there are some mistakes that should have been caught. The most glaring is a mountain drive scene where a road sign states icy conditions while the characters look dressed for spring and there’s no indication of any type of inclement weather.

Some of the transitions are rough and the score can get intrusive at times. There are some pockets of action scenes that suggests samurai battles can play out like a ballroom dance competition though that notion probably could have been leaned in even harder.

Dark Feathers: Dance of the Geisha has a premise that is very unconventional and could have worked with a stronger script and a willingness to go further with the subject matter.

Rating: 5 out of 10

Photo Credit: Lankis Entertainment

Dark Feathers: Dance of the Geisha is now available to rent or purchase on Amazon.

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