DANCE MOViES 3

DANCE MOViES: An ongoing EMPAC series showing the latest, daring work made by contemporary dancers creating short films and experimental videos. This selection of international films runs the gamut - from outrageous antics in unlikely places to animated bodies, all projected on the big screen. The third in the ongoing DANCE MOViES series, Ice Breaker presents six short films from the UK, Finland, Australia and the Netherlands that push the envelope of the form. From animated stick figures to ice skaters, from hilarious rubber-encased mayhem in a waiting room to the mystery and coolness of bodies floating in space, from partying in the snowy Alps to playing guitars in small-town Finland, each of these films immerses us in a unique world.

DANCE MOViES 3: Ice Breaker program:

Nascent, 2005 (Australia). 10 min. POD, 2005 (UK). 9 min. Snow, 2003 (UK). 8 min. Magnetic North, 2003 (UK and Finland). 9 min. Hohenluft, 2005 (Netherlands). 25 min. Total running time: 66 minutes

Nascent

2005, 10', (Australia) Created and directed by Gina Czarnecki Sound by Christian Fennesz Featuring the Dancers of the Australian Dance Theater Produced by forma and Australian Dance Theater Commissioned by forma and Adelaide Film Festival A mesmerizing experiment in which footage of Australian Dance Theater dancers is refracted and smeared, leaving traces and turbulent impressions across the screen. A striking and meditative exploration of bodies in motion.

POD

2005, 9', (UK) Directed by Shelly Love Four lackluster people kill time in a windowless waiting room. They notice a hole in the wall emitting and then imbibing a black fluid. Things go from strange to stranger as animate sheets of rubber start to encase faces and bodies and then the room itself.

Snow

2003, 8', (UK) Directed by Rosemary Lee and David Hinton Archival footage of winter antics from the 1890s to the 1960s is cut and re-combined to create a rhythmic choreography of gesture and action, on the slippery sidewalks and slopes of a bygone era.

Magnetic North

2003, 9', (UK and Finland) Directed and choreographed by Miranda Pennell The director casts a subtle eye on adolescent rituals playing out across the wintry landscapes of small-town Finland. Girls skate on a frozen lake, while boys play electric guitar in their rooms, dogs bark, the sun goes down. A thoughtful film which evokes fantasy and yearning.

Höhenluft

2005, 25', (Netherlands) Directed by Annick Vroom The latest film from the zany Amsterdam-based Hans Hof Ensemble is set in a 1920s sanatorium in the Swiss Alps, where hilarity runs at a fever pitch, literally, as the patients cavort, ignoring the facts of illness and death, preferring to crash headlong into love and folly.