La Danse

I saw the film when it premiered in Boston at the Brattle theater in Cambridge with my parents. Wiseman was there for a Q&A which was pretty basic.

At first, I felt as though the film was beautiful--verite-style as usual for the documentary filmmaker, but a bit too long.

Now that he's visited campus and I went to lunch and dinner with him and listened to two more Q&A sessions, I've been converted into a Wiseman fan. I would love to shoot documentary, if that's an accurate name, films and capture anything that fascinates me.

I thought Wiseman was extremely knowledgeable and forthcoming with a wry sense of humor that any witty person at 80 develops.

La Danse is a beautiful film--it's one of his most abstract. The rehearsals were fun for me to watch as a former ballet dancer; learning choreography takes years to master. It's a connection between the mind and body, if one can even polarize those two entities (dare I plunge into the stuff I learned in my Japanese art and religion class?), that must be formed over years of study and practice.

Wayne McGregor's choreography is by far my favorite. The modern dance runs parallel with digital trends, the body's movement reminding me of robotics and the kinetics of the human form.

Make an effort to see it or any of Wiseman's films. I also watched "High School", which was his second film, and was both touched and entertained by the film's ruthless representation of many people's hells. I want to see "Blind" and "Ballet" in order to compare the latter to "La Danse." "Ballet" is about ABT during a time when their money situation was a bit rocky; the two dance films are inherently different because of the companies they represent. I love how he shot "La Danse" because instead of doing ECU's all the time of feet and hands (which is incredibly annoying), he has an intriguing perspective from the corner of the stage that makes the film about the dancers, not the filmmaker.

I love how he allows his subjects to form the film; he doesn't force a thesis point or anything, but instead consolidates compelling or interesting moments in time into an appropriate length so that the audience can become immersed. The invisible man, they call him, I guess.

Anyway, I want to rent a camera from the library and start shooting my own stuff.

Here's the trailer for "La Danse".



In one of the Q&A's we learned that Wiseman, at 80, works out for 1hr40min every day to stay in shape so he can film. He has two projects in the works now and seems to be hitting a high point in his career after having released "La Danse", which has found much commercial success, especially in France.

He's my new film role model.

I could keep writing but I have reading to do for tomorrow. Laterrrr