Jo Turbitt speaks with the director of Dance:Film about the Festival, its past, present and future.
Jo Turbitt: For this year’s Festival, what’s your criteria for picking what’s going to be shown, for forming the Festival’s programme?
Steph Wright: Well (giggles), the opening and closing follows a tradition, opening with a Hollywood musical, a classic, and we traditionally close with an 80’s cheesy dance film, like Dirty Dancing or Flashdance. But with that I had the realisation that it’s a finite tradition. So, this year I thought we’d end that tradition with a bang! So we’re having an event called ‘Dance Till Dawn’ which is the all-nighter of 80’s cheesy dance films starting with Footloose – the original -, then we have Zanadu, then we have Flashdance and Dirty Dancing again, so it’s going to be like a total girls’ night out kinda thing, and I don’t see why all-nighters have to belong just to horror films… it’s going to be fun! We’re going to have prizes for the best 80’s dressed. We have a competition on Twitter and Facebook where someone has to rename our cocktail for the night to be themed to it, and then we’ll have performances…. It’s a proper night out! Good value too! The first year we showed Dirty Dancing, we filled Filmhouse One: 282 people and people were screaming and crying and laughing and whistling – it was awesome! We had a similar thing with Flashdance: it was great fun. That’s hopefully the spirit of ‘Dance till Dawn.’ In terms of the other films, one of the things for this year, one of the things I was very keen on, for many many months, was that I wanted to show Pina 3D because there were only two screenings in Edinburgh when it came out, on at the same time at the same night in two different cinemas, and that was it. So many people I know missed it in 3D.
I’m still undecided about 3D. If a film was shot in 2D I’d rather watch it in 2D and not 3D, but if a film is shot in 3D I believe you have to watch it in 3D because that’s the way it’s meant to be seen.
JT: Absolutely…. It’s like putting colour on black and white films.
SW: So Pina was the first thing I decided on, and Cineworld came on as a partner with that, which is great. It’s exquisite. It’s quite possibly the most accessible art-house dance documentary you’ll ever see. It’s so beautiful it makes you want to cry. It’s just stunning. It’s an example of how you can have a filmmaker’s eye looking at dance.
JT: On that note, this is a question that I’ve been toying with. Dance film is a lot about ‘framing’ and what always comes to mind when I think about framing something is John Berger’s book “Ways of Seeing,” about how we see, how we view. Do you think that training in dance film, how we frame things, should be incorporated into…
SW: I’ve always tried to hold events at Dance:Film to encourage people. I guess it’s what people call the “industry” side of things. We had a creative lab in ’09 where we had three spaces for choreographers and three spaces for film makers. It was a whole day workshop where they worked together. I’m a firm believer that you make better work if both art forms appreciate each other’s craft.
JT: Yes
SW: I see films which are made by dancers, in which the dance is great but they don’t have the perspective of the filmmaker in there… and vice versa, and I know that because they are different art forms they end up being frustrated at each other. However, just think about what wonderful things you can do if you work together, and I think Pina 3D is a great example because Wim Wenders the director had this passion for Pina [Bausch] and her work, and I guess he worked with the dancers to create all these set pieces, and that’s brilliant because it’s working together, as opposed to a filmmaker telling the choreographer what to do. Or like a choreographer hiring a film maker and telling them what to do. I think when you actually work together, what comes out of it is much better. A lot of the films that were submitted, you could tell that that’s what happened… framing, the set-ups, the lighting and the choreography and how the camera moves with it, you can tell it was a collaboration.
JT: One of the beautiful things that you can do with it is take people ‘in.’ For instance, to film a tap dancer’s feet, right in… the different components of what makes it all up rather than simply recording a dancer dancing, as well as ‘okay here’s what you see, but this is what it looks like from all these different angles.’
SW: Well, I invite submissions under three categories. One is ‘Dance for Camera’ featuring dance choreographed specifically for the camera, and then there’s ‘Dance with Camera’ where the medium of the camera is actually integral to the piece, whether that’s how it moves or how you use it, how it affects animation. And there’s ‘Is it dance?’ which is the more experimental side of things, more visual arty…. You watch it and you don’t necessarily think, ‘OK, they’re dancing’, but the movement has a choreographic quality to it.
JT: Are there any future goals for the Festival this year, for the future festivals… what are the main things you hope the festival achieves?
SW: I have grand plans for screen dance in general. I don’t want to set any artistic direction on it at all; I just want to help make it happen. The Festival itself is my own little curating fun. I can justify everything I’ve chosen, but in terms of screen dance I don’t profess to be an expert, and there are many experts out there. I just want to help it develop. I just want to get it out there and, with the Festival, I hope that it’s a way of getting other people involved in it. But in terms of the future, everything depends on funding.
JT: If money was no object….?
SW: If money was no object… I’d like to run a screen dance agency that is an advocate and support agency for screen dance and developing screen dance. Dance:Film would be the festival that is the platform for showing the work. I’m still quite keen on the biennial festival, although last year [2010], we did a mini-festival during the Fringe that was (I quite blatantly put in on my website) copied from Berwick Film Festival, where they used to have a big festival, mini-festival, big festival, mini-festival…. And I love that idea because with a mini-festival you can have a slightly different focus….
JT: …and it helps to keep it ticking over, keeps it in public awareness…..
SW: Yeah, and it’s just trying something a bit different, including pre-curated work, live performances, tributes and installations. I love the idea of installations. I love the idea of interactive, ‘one-on-one’ stuff. I wanted to have a lot more installations this year, but it’s a funding and venue issue. I tried to contact several AV shops around the city and most of them came back with ‘no,’ except the Home Cinema Centre--which was brilliant! So we’re having an installation there this festival,
JT: Cool!
SW: It’s a 3D installation. Billie Cowie’s piece. It’s free, so they were totally up for it; it’s in their demo room. It’ll be a 3D projector projecting onto a 110-inch electric screen and it’s proper active shutter glasses, so it’s going to look amazing in high definition! Starts on Saturday, just go in, two/ three people at a time and you can watch it in a private demo room which has a sofa – lovely! The image itself is actually 3D….
JT: Woah!
SW: Yeah, essentially it’s two images (one slightly out of sync with the other) put side by side and the projector turns it into 3D, so it will look amazing. People have yet to use 3D properly. This installation does use it properly – you essentially have the dancer come out of the screen at you and it’s just lovely.
JT: Is that one of your must-see events?
SW: Yeah, well I’m keen on everything! I think it’s all a must-see. There are more installations exploring different ideas, then we have a programme of shorts on the BBC big screen that start on Sunday, and then lots of films, documentary films, interviews, breakdance competitions, talks, workshops, events. A creative event called Ideastap which we had 62 responses to, which is great—it means there are a lot of young film makers out there. It’s all incredible.
JT: Awesome! It sounds like an absolutely vibrant amazing festival. It’s not something which should be brushed to the side and overlooked; it needs to be completely paid attention to….
SW: Yup, because a lot of it’s about fun. And dance is about fun! No one dances if they’re not enjoying it, that’s the thing…. Dance is one of these things that’s so passionate, and if it somehow introduces more people to film or dance then that’s what it’s all about!
The Dance:Film 2011 festival runs from Saturday 12th November to Saturday 19th November at varies venues across the city. For more information, click on the link here.
RSS