FilmFest by Rogue Dancer: AMONGst the People Edition (August 2021)
Aug 20th - Sept 5th, 2021
Your Playbill
Symphony of the Body
film by Mónica Ruiz van Hattem (c) 2019 NETHERLANDS
In the modern architecture of Central Station in Rotterdam, two Mediterranean men front the cold efficiency of this industrial area. The building seems impenetrable for the vulnerable desire to meet a stranger. Till their shadow breaks through a light dome and they become aware of each other’s desire. Can a body, with the softness of dance and music, break the incantation of steel and stone?
Mónica Ruiz van Hattem - Director
Downriver
film by Andrea Boll (c) 2020 SWITZERLAND
Water - Leonardo da Vinci called it 'the blood of the planet'. A group of people emerges from the water. They try to resist the current of the river and the stream of people in the city, but have to surrender to the flow and are washed ashore. On the shore, the stranded seek for hold and refuge. In the course of the film ‘against or with the flow', ‘resistance and devotion’ manifest as a primal instinct, as a survival strategy. Andrea Boll - Director & Choreography Peter Kadar - Cinematography, Editor & Steadicam operator Chris Fawcett - Cinematography & Steadicam operator Alex Zampini - Composition & Sound Design Nico Gutmann - Producer Ramón Orza - Sound mix Dancers - Ivan Blagajcevic, Andrea Boll, Chris de Feyter, Hella Immler & Emeric Rabot
WECreate Spaces – Limerick
film by Ana Baer & Heike Salzer (c) 2020 UK
WECreate Spaces - Limerick is a poetic visual portrait of the historic city of Limerick. Bodies and costume merge with the materials and shapes, resonating the textural and rhythmic layers of the urban landscapes. The work suggests an embodied ethnographic view of the local, drawing on the visceral ability of the artists to capture ephemeral sensibilities through their presence. This montage highlights echoes of the now along with fragments of the past, revealing the stories that are engrained in the desecrated architecture and felt through the movements of the people of the city. Ana Baer - Director, Camera & Editing Heike Salzer - Director, Choreographer & Dancer Michelle Nance - Choreography & Dancer Joaquin Lopez Chas - Original Music Robert Burton - Costume design WECreate Productions - Producer
EXODUS
film by Zbigniew Cierniak (c) 2020 POLAND
Exodus - a phenomenon in which each participant of a multi-person journey undergoes individual challenges. This test reveals the deeply hidden secrets of the human personality thus forcing to make personal choices. Pulled into the vortex of mass supremacy, everyone is coping with the reality on its own. The final decision is made each time according to its own rules, guided by intuition, emotions or common sense. This is how a lonely journey through the recesses of one's own soul takes place, the aim of which is to find one's place among other travelers wandering on the ocean of the Universe. Zespół Pieśni i Tańca "Sląsk" im. Stanisława Hadyny - Producer Zbigniew Cierniak - Director Tomasz Janikowski - Deputy director Jarosław Świątek - Artistic director Michaił Zubkow - Ballet director Krzysztof Anczyk - Choir director Danuta Smyła - Orchestra director
Watch, and Being Watched
film by Siye Tao (c) 2021 CHINA
A group of amateur dancers, immerse themselves in a metropolitan city, probe and explore the world with their fluidic movements. In various settings, they found that, while observing the world presented upon them, they themselves become the object of observation by many others. The interaction between the dancers and their casual ‘audience’ makes their roles – audience vs. performer – blurred and interchangeable. Who are the performers and who are the audience? This is the question this short film tries to ask. Siye Tao - Director, Writer, Producer & Editor Qing-Wen Yan - Cinematographer & Editor Bin Tan - Music/Sound Dancers & Choreographers - Jaeven Aylor, Amy Ernst, Xiao Liang, Nathalia Lin Yinqi Wang & Siye Tao
OUTOPIA
film by Helen Rollins (c) 2020 UK
During a rehearsal for a bleak play about puritans, an actor becomes strangely compelled by then stuck in the floor, finding beneath it a world of kitsch and colour that ultimately traps him too. First film in a series of experimental shorts by unknown Slovene director Franc Kranjc. Helen Rollins - Director & Writer Adrian Romero - Writer & Producer Johnny Rollins - Producer Peter Rollins - Producer Lisa Kruse - Producer Jack Boyle - Key Cast
Mutable Spirals of Ascension
film by Laida Aldaz Arrieta (c) 2020 BELGIUM & SPAIN
Mutable Spirals of Ascension is a dance for camera work that follows two dancers as they navigate Shanghai’s bustling streets, urban forests and massive industrial sites in search of connections to wild. The video seeks to identify and dissolve barriers between human and wild in the Anthropocene where we are increasingly more likely to navigate urban jungles comprised of concrete and glass than an old growth forest and its streams; where we are more likely to touch manmade, inanimate materials than the constantly changing and sensing textures of nature; where we are more immersed in the scent of gas and smoke than grass and bark; and, where we spend more time making eye contact with our own digital image than we do with our neighbors. Jessica Gomula-Kruzic - Director & Cinematography Calvin Aham - Dancer Pauline Jennings - Choreographer & Dancer Sean Clute - Music Composition Amy Neilson - Costume Design Allen Hahn - Cinematography Julia Tavares - Assistant Editor Gemima Segura - Assistant Editor Christopher Benson - Assistant Editor
Queen's Dreem
fim by Mark Freeman (USA)
Queens Dream is a site-specific dance for film at Niki de St. Phalle's Queen Califia's Magical Circle. Groups of dancers in black are reflected in the mirrors of the maze that guards the entrance to the site. Portholes and archways open to hidden worlds. Trance, ritual and repetition combine in a magical world invoking our unconscious dreams. markfreemanfilms.org Mark Freeman - Director & Producer Yolande Snaith - Choreographer
The Dérive
film by Tanin Torabi (c) 2019 ISLAMIC REBULBLIC OF IRAN
An exploration of social and cultural issues. A dancer moves among the people in an old bazaar in Tehran capturing the responses and reactions. Tanin Torabi - Director, Writer & Producer Faran Fahimi - Composer Milad Sanaei - Director Assistant & Cinematographer
ISOLATIONS
film by Talia Shea Levin (c) 2020 USA
A 16mm dance project created in response to shelter in place orders in Los Angeles, CA, March 2020. An outlet for chaos and the enduring need to connect. Safer apart, alone together. Talia Shea Levin - Director MUDA / Maritza Navarro - Choreography Amanda Leigh Jerry - Original Alex Knee - Original Song Dancers - Jasmine Agredano, Juliet Deem, Kat Devoe-Peterson, Lynn Hong, Arie Levine, Micah Moch. Katie Peabody, Soren Royer-McHugh & David Clifford Turner Adam Leene - Cinematographer Lynn Hong - Editor
Born Like a Bullet
film by Jimmy Fernandez (c) 2020 CHILE
"Born Like a Bullet" is a collaboration project which combines poetry, dance and film, all in one, with the objective of creating awareness of our heritage and human rights. Like our black brothers, we have faced social discrimination and constant harassment by certain political figures. We´ve had enough. This must stop now and this is our way of protest. We want to let the world know that we our proud of being latinos. Jimmy Fernandez - Director & Producer Christian Gonzalez S. - Co-Director Matias Alvarado - Cinematographer
Valete
film by Yoshito Sakuraba, Hitoshi Igarashi, Yuki Kunishima (c) 2019 USA
A short dance film by an award-winning choreographer, expressing a timeless space where the lost souls gather and farewell. Valete is latin meaning a farewell to more than one person. Yoshito Sakuraba - Director, Dancer & Producer Hitoshi Igarashi - Director Yuki Kunishima - Director Laurent Uhres - Key Cast
Colony
film by Didier MULLERAS (c) 2020 FRANCE
colony: a group of one species, that live and interact closely with each other, usually for mutual benefit such as stronger defense Didier MULLERAS - Director Didier MULLERAS, studios Espace 13 Beziers France - Producer team workshop Espace 13 - Key Cast
ctrlC/ctrlV
film by Dina Veryutina (c) 2017 RUSSIAN FEDERATION
sometimes we loose our identity and erase the limits of our personality. To cut this sequence of ctrlCs/ctrlVs we need to stop. Dina Veryutina - Director DK-more culture - Producer Aleksander Ludashin - Choreographer