Posts Tagged ‘pop culture’

By Dawn Paap with Anna Brady Nuse

VESTED by Kristi Faulkner

U.S. Women's Soccer

At our last Kinetic Cinema screening on April 8th, guest curator Lisa Niedermeyer presented dance films to be seen through the lens of professional sports. She featured the work of dance film makers: Charles Dennis, Alan McIntyre Smith, Lemeh42, Miriam King, Kristi Faulkner and Sylvain White.

Alongside special guest, sports videographer Ray Wenzel, Jr., six films from the above mentioned film makers were showcased to illustrate sports elements, including speed, effort, kinetic response, spectacle, competition, and endurance.

There are many shared elements between Dance and Sports.  This screening offered several suggestions of utilizing professional sports as a lens to help see heighten aspects of dance in film.

Illusion for Movements by Lemeh42

There are a number of ways to draw in the viewer to elicit a response to movement on screen. Lisa, speaking from a performer, videographer and editor’s standpoint, felt most drawn to the aspect of kinetic response for both dance and sports on film.  For her, it is important to connect with what the performer is experiencing internally to understand the story of the film maker and she illustrated her point with the film Illusion of Movements by the Italian duo, Lemeh42. In this film a woman is filmed in extreme close-up (hands, feet, chest) while she is having [what looks like] an epileptic seizure. Through the fragmented views of the woman’s convulsing body, the viewer gets a taste of what it must feel like to suddenly loose all muscular control.

Stomp the Yard

I feel that the internal experience of the performer is important, but when I think of professional sports, I find myself drawn more to the “atmosphere” or dramatic flair of an event.  I respond to the important actions during certain moments of a sporting event, and I think of capturing speed, danger and the emotions of the spectators.  Spectacle was one of the Points of View presented in the evening, and it was illustrated by an excerpt from Sylvain White’s Stomp the Yard in which two step crews battle it out on the dance floor in front of throngs of hyped up fans. For me, of all the works shown, this piece came the closest to evoking the feelings I get when watching sports. I felt connected to the situation of the competition, to groups of performers and spectators, and to the intensity of the moment.

Ray, speaking from the point of view of a sports videographer, shared his preference for capturing images to enhance the storyline of whatever sport event he’s shooting.  With each film presented, he pointed out specific details of the film making that gave life to the stories.

DUST by Anthony Atanasio and Miriam King

One of the most compelling narratives of the evening was Miriam King and Anthony Atanasio’s DUST, commissioned by South East Dance in the UK. Here a woman in a bathing suit and googles slowly breast strokes her way through a desert landscape, battling heat, dust, and time to reach water. The film captured one of the hardest things to show on screen, the inner game that goes on inside every performer and athlete, but which lies at the heart of every great story.

Ray shared a story about a niche form of car racing called endurance racing, which he shoots every year. In endurance racing, the team that travels the greatest distance around the track in 24 hours wins. He talked about a race in Florida last year where the top two teams were only 10 seconds apart from each other after 12 hrs and only a few minutes apart at the very end. This is like crossing the country in 24 hrs, leaving from New York and ending up neck and neck at the finish line at the Pacific Ocean. For Ray, the drama lies in how well the teams work together and their ability to endure and battle fatigue to be the fastest, most efficient racers over a long period of time. This is not easy to capture on film, however it is his task as a camera-man to tell a captivating story for the viewers. He also shared ways he works to capture “behind the scenes footage” of games and races, such as the choreographed and skillful moves of a race crew changing a tire and refueling a car in 15 seconds flat, or how hockey players maneuver around the player with the puck to set up the perfect pass. All of these details are hidden gems of information that help to bring a sporting competition (or a dance) to life on screen.

Regardless of the preferences one may have for viewing sports or dance films, there are many interesting areas of overlap between the two. This screening offered insights into a few of these areas of intersection. A companion program to this screening would be to look at sports on screen from the point of view of dance. For instance the balletic leap of the wide receiver making a catch in the end zone and replayed in slow motion. Elements of grace certainly seem to come up in sports footage all the time. I’m sure there are many more lenses to find! Anyone have suggestions for the sequel: P.O.V. Dance? List them here, or relay your own experiences seeing a dance on film that evoked a response normally associated with sports viewing…

Just in time for the new baseball season, at the next Kinetic Cinema on April 8th choreographer, performer and videographer, Lisa Niedermeyer will present an evening of screen dance through the lens of professional sports. Alongside special guest, sports videographer Ray Wenzel Jr., Niedermeyer will present and discuss dance films that feature heightened Speed, Kinetic Response, Spectacle, Competition and Endurance. Featuring the work of dance film-makers: Charles Dennis, Alan McIntyre Smith, Lemeh42, Miriam King, Kristi Faulkner and Sylvain White.

Coming up next at Kinetic Cinema:

P.O.V: PRO SPORTS

Curated by Lisa Niedermeyer

Wednesday, April 8, 2009 7:00pm

Tickets: $10 (purchase at the door)

*A co-presentation of Chez Bushwick and Pentacle’s Movement Media

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At our last Kinetic Cinema screening on March 11th, guest curator Marya Wethers showed at a different side of the screendance spectrum than our usual experimental fare: Hollywood action films that feature powerful female leads kicking butt.

T-X from Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

The evening was arranged by character, with Marya giving background exposition about each woman and illustrating her points with key scenes from films. The characters featured in the program reflected Marya’s personal favorites, and weren’t meant to encompass the entire range and history of female characters in action films. Rather it was a personal tour of the ladies that have inspired Marya the most, and she made us all feel like we were sitting in her living room sifting through the best bits of her DVD collection.

Some of my favorites from the evening were:

Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) from The Matrix series.

Pure elegance punctuated with vulnerability. In the opening scene from The Matrix, Trinity seduces you with a slow motion leap, before giving you a sharp crack in the nose.

Trinity's Kick

Lara Croft (Angelina Jolie) from Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.

The Bungee Ballet scene combines high adventure with silk pajamas. Gotta love Lara’s McGyver-like ingenuity, using her remote car starter to blind the enemies with a garage full of headlights while making a getaway on her motorcycle.

Lara's bungee ballet workout gets interrupted.

T-X (Kristanna Loken) from Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.

She’s an advanced cybernetic organism from the future and she kicks Arnold’s ass!

The Angels (Drew Barrymore as Dylan Sanders, Cameron Diaz as Natalie Cook, and Lucy Liu as Alex Munday) from Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle.

These ladies take teamwork to a new level. When the lights go out they tap morse code on each other’s palms to communicate. They’re also not afraid to take a punch. You see them get seriously messed up, but no mind, they just spit out the blood, pull out the glass, and keep on kicking ass!

The Angels

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I just want to take a moment to crush on Richert Schnorr’s amazing dance videos that look so damn good on his video blog, REGULARMOTION. Take a look and you’ll see what I’m saying.

He just posted an online version of his fabulous videodance series “GRAPHIC.GLORY” that is also for sale as a DVD (Track 2 is shown above). He mentioned that his concept is to make great albums, like pop music albums but with dance. The result is so sexy, fun, and tasty you just can’t get enough. Rock on Richert! We love you!!!

For all the ladies…

Charlie's Angels

“Bad Ass Babes: A Guide to Women Kicking Butt in the Movies”

Curated by Marýa Wethers
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
7:00pm
Tickets: $10 (purchase at the door)

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For the past 12 years, Marýa Wethers, has been a major contributor to the experimental dance community in NYC as a performer, administrator, and currently as the Associate Producer at Dance Theater Workshop. What you may not know is that she is also a huge action movie fan. At Kinetic Cinema on Wed March 11th, Marýa will share clips of selected scenes from some of her favorite Hollywood action movies with a female lead or a strong female character. The clips will follow themes such as hand-to-hand combat, weapons, and car chases. These scenes go beyond silly cat fights and show some bad ass women kicking some serious butt. Wowser!

Come on out and show off your own bad ass selves. Dress up as your favorite action heroine and we’ll post pictures of the best-dressed babes here on our blog.

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