Lace up your toe shoes and head over to the Balboa Theater this Friday for a one week run of La Danse, a documentary about the Paris Opera Ballet.
Renowned filmmaker Frederick Wiseman takes us behind the scenes of one of France’s principal cultural institutions and the world’s great ballet companies, showing us how the company functions from administration, technical support, and classes, to the rehearsal and performance.
The film follows the production of seven ballets – Paquita by Pierre Lacotte, The Nutcracker by Rudolf Noureev, Genus by Wayne McGregor, Medea by Angelin Preljocaj, The House of Bernarda Alba by Mats Ek, Romeo and Juliet by Sasha Waltz and Orpheus and Eurydyce by Pina Bausch.
A.O. Scott of the New York Times says La Danse “is one of the finest dance films ever made”.
Scott writes, “In “La Danse†you watch closely as dancers and choreographers break complex movements down into their constituent gestures, a process that is at once tedious and entirely engrossing. Though all the rehearsing culminates in full-dress performance, “La Danse†really has no beginning, middle or end. It is, rather, about two kinds of time that exist outside traditional narrative frameworks: the long, slow, repetitive cycle in which institutions exist, and the fleeting moments of bodily motion and musical expression that make ballet such a singular and elusive art form.”
La Danse opens Friday, December 4 at the Balboa Theater, 3630 Balboa Street, between 37th and 38th Avenues with showtimes daily at 1:00 (bargain matinee), 4:10, and 7:30. This film will only be there for one week so don’t miss it!
Sarah B.