Posts Tagged ‘film’

Don’t miss the last Kinetic Cinema before we break for the summer!

“Staying Alive” dir. Sylvester Stallone, “Showgirls”
dir. Paul Verhoeven

On Monday June 2nd, choreographer and dance
filmmaker Kriota Willberg will host The Worst
of the Best, a tour of inspiringly bad dance films from the early 1900’s to the
present. Truly awful dance is powerful art.  We react strongly to it as an
audience, we relate our horrible experiences to our friends and warn them away
from it, we laugh, we seethe, we remember it far longer than
“good” dance, and possibly longer than “great” dance.   Join us for
film and discussion as we chase that ethereal muse, Badness, through the work of generations of dance film artists.

Kinetic Cinema
Monday June 2nd, 7:30pm
$5 Admission (buy tix at the door)

@ Collective:Unconscious 
279 Church
Street (just south of White Street)
New York, NY 10013
Trains: 1 to Franklin;
A, C, E to Canal
http://weird.org/films.htm
212.254.5277
MORE INFO: www.movetheframe.com
 

Kinetic Cinema at Collective:Unconscious explores the intersection
of dance and the moving image both on screen and stage. Each month curator Anna
Brady Nuse invites a special guest from the dance community to share the films
and videos that have inspired or moved them. These could be films that feature
dance, are kinetic-based, or have been influential on their work in some way.
The guest curators come from a range of backgrounds as performers, choreographers,
critics, and filmmakers. In the fall upcoming guests will include Elizabeth
Zimmer (Oct 5th),  Maya Ciarrocchi (Nov 3rd), and new films by
Anna Brady Nuse & friends (Dec 1st).

KRIOTA WILLBERG has danced and choreographed in Germany, Chicago,
and New York.
In addition to working with her company, Dura Mater, Willberg choreographs for
commercial, theatrical, and other dance productions. Dance choreography for
film includes The Bentfootes  (dir. K. Willberg and Todd Alcott),
Grasshopper  (dir. Todd Alcott), Dreamgirl (dir. Robbie Busch), and
On The Road With Judas (dir. JJ Lask). She has passed her basic proficiency
tests in Single Sword and Broadsword techniques from the Society of American
Fight Directors (SAFD) and occasionally includes fight choreography in her own
work and for others. Her article on dance and stage combat was published in the
SAFD magazine, The Fightmaster. Her ballerina tattoo was featured in Dance
Magazine.

Dance bloggers and dance film lovers everywhere, mark your calendars now for the first ever Dance Movie Blogathon happening May 4-10, 2008!

I can’t claim credit for this great idea, that honor goes to Marilyn Ferdinand who publishes the Ferdy on Films, etc. blog. She is organizing this fabulous event to bring awareness to the important contributions dance has made to cinema since its beginnings from Edison’s Serpentine Dance to the latest Hollywood dance hits like Step Up 2: The Streets.

In her announcement post Ferdy writes:

Ferdy on Films, etc. is proud to host the Invitation to the Dance Movie Blogathon, May 4 through May 10. The last day of the blogathon just happens to be the birthday of one of
the greatest dancers ever to grace the silver screen–Fred Astaire.
Contributions on that date that discuss Astaire are particularly
welcome. Please RSVP to ferdyonfilms@comcaust.net. Link to this page before the event and to Ferdy on Films, etc. during the week of the blogathon.

I will be churning out posts about my favorite dance on screen moments, and you should too! Spread the word and the link to the Ferdy on Films, etc. blog.

Here’s a little clip of Fred from Puttin’ on the Ritz to get you ready.

I’m tired. It’s the end of January and everything seems too much right now. After three weeks of the Dance On Camera Festival, Kinetic Cinema, APAP, grant deadlines looming, school starting, work going overtime, relentless presidential campaigns, and a never-ending war I’m just tired…

So, here is something that gave me a lift at 10:42pm on a Thursday night. Time to get up out of your chair, push it aside, and give in to an inscrutably optimistic force of nature…

Dancing 4 fun + fitness with Paul Eugene

Alright, now that you’re warmed up, here is the final scene of one of my favorite dance movies of all time “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.” (Warning: Age-specific content. People in their late twenties or early thirties may be the only ones to appreciate this.) This one goes out to my girl Nadine, who has been devoted to Sarah Jessica Parker since day one…

Ahhh, the smile is coming back to my face. Life isn’t sooo bad…

One more to send me off to bed. From my favorite master of cinematic fantasy, Busby Berkeley, here are three incredible clips from his 1934 classic, “Dames”. (For dance film geeks out there, see also Michel Gondry’s music video of the Chemical Brothers “Let Forever Be”, he obviously studied this film closely!)

I feel better now, I hope you do too

Clare Byrne and I have been having a discussion offsite about the way artists in the NYC downtown dance scene treat their audiences. I’ve been feeling that contemporary experimental dancers here tend to view and treat their audiences as enemies and antagonists rather than as friends, guests, or supporters. Clare reminded me that artists, especially experimental ones, aren’t making work just to entertain and console their audiences, but also occasionally to upset them and “ruffle some feathers.”  I agree that this is a very important function of the arts. Like good journalists, and wise fools, we need artists to shake people up and get them to see new things or think for themselves. But when I look at the dance scene in my city I see a bunch of rebels with no cause. Who are in their audiences? Basically other dancers who seem to take masochistic pleasure in the hate and apathy spewed at them from their friends on stage. Gen X’s irony looks like tin foil to Gen Y. And earnestness? Don’t even whisper the word ironically in passing or you’ll find yourself sneered and hissed right out of Bushwick.

I’m saying all this because I don’t feel like the lofty role of artist as social conscience, lighting rod, or martyr is what I’m seeing here. I see preaching to the choir, not risk-taking. I see insecurity and followers, not leaders and trend-setters.

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As a videodance artist, I have to comment on the viral video sensation of the Philippine Prison dances that have rocked Youtube as of late. These massive stagings, in which up to 1600 prisoners dance to pop hits in perfect unison, are as awesome and powerful as they are campy and scary. Byron Garcia, a security consultant for the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Centre started the dance fitness program as a way to improve inmates’ behaviour and increase their participation in exercises. However the inspiration to start filming the routines came when Mr. Garcia saw prisoners exercising in the prison courtyard and noticed patterns and waves in their movement which piqued his inner Busby Berkeley. The result was a string of videos and a gigantic Youtube hit with “Thriller” performed by 1500 prisoners and featuring inmates Crisanto Nierre as “Michael Jackson,” and Wenjiel Resane as his “girlfriend”. “Thriller” has been viewed over 6 million times now on Youtube. The popularity of the videos have become a huge source of pride for the inmates, and now the CPDRC is becoming a veritable production house of grand spectacle dance films, the likes of which haven’t been seen since the heyday of American movie musicals in the 30’s and 40’s.

“Thriller” (original upload)

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