On the Right Track

Have you ever noticed how the grandeur of architecture can inspire movement? Architects often use scale, along with other design principles such as light, rhythm, and form, to subtly guide a person's eye and body through a space—to take the gaze at street level to the highest point of a building, or to the horizon and beyond. As a choreographer and filmmaker, these considerations have always influenced my choices and decisions when working on site. Not only can a place inspire movement, but the body in motion can indeed humanize an onlooker’s experience of buildings themselves.

Performance

“Train Train,” a dance film by Benjamin Seroussi

Place

Words

Still from “Train Train,” a dance film by Benjamin Seroussi

Such is the case with the short dance film Train Train, which also doubles as a music video for the wonderful and singular piano music of Koki Nokano. The film—one of my all time favorites by filmmaker, Benjamin Seroussi—is part of a series of works by Nokano, deftly entitled “Pre-Choreographed.” According to the choreographer, the amazing and articulate Damien Jalet, “Benjamin suggested shooting in this incredible tower whose bare iron structure has the rhythm and aspect of an abandoned train track.” The aforementioned building is the—stripped for refurbishment—and “haunting” Pleyel Tower in St. Denis, Paris, which in the film’s beginning looms like a ghostly and abandoned skyscraper.

In Train Train, Seroussi, Jalet, and dancer Aimilios Aropoglou, explore gestural movements that I found to be reminiscent of a train conductor. And with a mixture of almost Chaplinesque prancing, running, fall and recovery, the dancer redefines apparent “clumsiness” as dance. What is incredible is that choreography, and camera work together, with editing of course, to eloquently visualize the chaos and tension within the score itself. And in the process they seem to quite successfully break all kinds of rules and conventions, making both shots and movement that might otherwise translate as awkward or dizzying—look brilliant.

Still from “Train Train,” a dance film by Benjamin Seroussi

The film opens with a series of quick cut, moving shots, tilted angles of both building and dancer who is also in movement. He begins at ground level, the building looming behind him. We soon see camera scaling the hugely cavernous and open structure from the exterior to ultimately find Aropoglou paused and ready to proceed at speed from the inside. What ensues seems to defy conventional notions of what is possible choreographically—almost upending the laws of gravity and physics for the human body—all while proceeding at a continuously brisk pace through the space. Aropoglou rolls and recovers on the concrete almost like a piece of tumble weed. He falls and reverses his movement seemingly without the hindrance of bone or muscle.

There is tremendous intelligence and subtlety in the dance, music, and camera as an ensemble. And for myself—almost in contradiction to his gravity defying movement—Aropoglou’s expression and appearance convey a great deal of humanity, vulnerability and feeling, making Train Train stand out as not only remarkable, but singular and and moving. And at the end, much like the beginning, the camera swipes up and away from the building as the music ends almost abruptly, as if to say, all this will continue ever onwards . . .

Sarah Elgart

Sarah Elgart is an award winning choreographer, director, movement director, and producer, creating original content for stage, site and screen, whose work has been seen internationally. Sarah’s ScreenDance Diaries is one of the first articles on the genre of Dance Film (originally for Cultural Daily). An alumna of the Sundance Institute’s Dance/Film Lab, AFI’s DWW, and a director member of the DGA, Sarah is Founder/Director of Dare to Dance in Public Film Festival (www.dare2danceinpublic.com). @arrogantelbow @dare2danceinpublic

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