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Oct 26

Weapon of Choice – an unapologetic panegyric

Lise Smith

Fatboy Slim, I have to celebrate you. It’s hard for me to be coldly analytic about one of my favourite music videos – nay, one of my favourite short films – ever, so I’m not even going to try. This is going to be a solid gold panegyric, three hundred words of nothing but effusive praise. I have to praise you like I should.

In an era of music promos featuring identikit popstrels performing overfamiliar street-jazz routines in monotonous unison, with intrusive close-ups of the face and midriff of the otherwise forgettable pop muppet in question, it’s good to be reminded that there are artists with a genuine interest in making a creative product to accompany their music. And it’s great to be reminded also, in the figure of Christopher Walken, what genuine star quality is.

Walken’s character in the video is deliberately unglamorous – he wears a shabby, dun-coloured suit and his face appears ashen. He sits in a bland hotel foyer with only the hum of a hoover for company. Walken is, of course familiar to millions for his ice-cold Bond villain and crime boss characters, so it’s a surprise for many to see him leap up from his lonely seat and tapdance to Fatboy Slim’s latest floor-filler. That Walken is a trained dancer who performed in musicals as a younger man was news to most.

The movement has a wonderfully relaxed quality to it – although Walken’s tapping is scintillatingly rhythmic, he performs much of the material with hands casually in pockets and with minimal effort showing in the face. Parts of the material are gently mimetic: on the line “You can go with this,” Walken gestures to the side with a hand. Other sections have more visual dash – a sequence where Walken executes a series of fast stepping turns through a double-mirrored corridor, causing infinite reflections of the dancer, lingers long in the mind.

The illusion of a middle-aged man (Walken was 58 when he shot the video) having fun in a hotel-shaped playground is somewhat broken towards the end when the actor takes to a harness and flies around the lobby. This fantasy sequence actually takes away some of the magic for me – I prefer the idea of the jaded man having a moment of plausible pleasure, dancing around the escalators and corridors of the hotel, and this final sequence breaks my suspension of disbelief. But that one small niggle aside, Weapon of Choice remains one of the most inventive, original and surprising videos of the last ten years. And all without a hint of midriff in sight.

Oct 26

Fatboy Slim vs. Trisha Brown

Martina Rösler

Two short films, two different genres, two locations: a hotel and a dance studio

Fatboy Slim

The music video „Weapon of choice“ follows a narrative structure. A man sitting in a chair rather bored or depressed is somehow activated by the music. His dance is directly addressed to the camera/the spectator, as he wants to impress us with his “show”. In the environment of a hotel lobby movement-elements of jazz dance, tab-dance are put together to a choreography. Suddenly the man starts flying through the lobby, we enter a surrealistic layer, which creates an absurdity of the whole event. In the end he returns to the chair from the beginning as nothing has happened.

Trisha Brown

It is a document of Trisha Browns solo “Water Motor” from the year 1978, recorded in a dance studio by Bebette Mangolte. Her particularly movement quality, loose, casual including movements of everyday life working with different tensions, swings, jumps, at that time a new approach to dance. We see the solo twice, one time in normal speed, afterwards in slow motion. In between a fade-out and a fade-in. The camera is fixed, but follows Trisha Browns movement (with a pan shot).

(to be continued…)

Oct 26

fatboy slim exc.

Julie Rodeyns

We all know we shouldn’t judge people on the first eye, but still to often we do. Spike Jonzes proves us wrong in a video clip for ‘Weapon of choice’ by Fatboy Slim. The American filmmaker introduces us to a business man in tie and costume, sitting in an archair, looking a bit bored. All of a sudden, he starts making little tic mouvements with his head, as if suddenly he fell under some kind of spell. When he next stands up from his chair, he immediately starts dancing to the (…) music in a very confident, energetic and upfront way- facing the camera as much as possible. Soon, he starts taking bigger leaps, dancing his way through the hallways, jumping on a table where he tries out some tapdance moves, .. At the pique of his dance, he jumps from the second floor into the air, sailing to a huge painting in the lobby of the hotel. The painting shows three boats, sailing away under a cristal blue skye. Not only is the guy trough his dancing exploring the physical space (and we with him), he now also takes us to a possible imaginative mental space- away from the dreary interior of the hotel lobby. Just for a short moment tough, because soon enough the guy in a superman-ly way lands back on the floor again. Nevertheless, when he again takes up his initial position, we can never look at him in the same way anymore then we did. Even your everyday grey yuppie guy is not always what he seems like.

Oct 26

Eyeing Dance

Eylül Akıncı

Christopher Walken’s swing solo in Spike Jonze video Weapon of Choice is so playful and animated –as much as the music is- that it tags the camera behind him, rather than trying to squeeze into its frame. The visual richness of the environment (which is the halls and lobbies of a big and prestigious looking hotel) with hazy and pastel colors is quite fitting to the genre contextually. There is a cinematic quality resulting from the different plans and scenes, as well as the use of invisible ropes to “magically” fly Walken in the air. Although the music is not conventional swing, it provides the proper rhythm for dance, and in turn swing dance is successful to show the song’s funkiness.

By her solo in Water Motor filmed by Babette Mangolte, one can feel that Trisha Brown is creating colors and movement in the monochrome video which is shot in single plan and angle. Camera follows her movements in linear direction in right-left axle. The picture does not have much contrast and sharpness, and it is in tones of grey. Trisha Brown’s movements, especially in the second slow motion part, creates relieves on the plain background and floor. Her choreography is very dynamic with frequent jumps and turns, and it is even more pronounced with the visible waves of her hair and clothes during the second half. The camera seems to move very slightly, yet thanks to double framing it discloses the multiplicity of movements, thus contributing to the motion in a very subtle way.

Oct 26

An Essay on Invisibility

Iulia Popovici

(since I’m feeling so guilty for missing today, here you are a text about the Rimini Protokoll performance I saw a week ago; be as critical as you like)

Abdulah (Mr. Dağaçar), Aziz, Mithat and Bayram are experts. They have very precise working hours, they know everything about the object of their activity; they are the best in their field for expertise.

Abdulah, Aziz, Mithat and Bayram are professionals. Experts in trash. Some would call (and are calling) them scavengers. Every day, they cross the Turkish capital with their self-made sort of carriages, in search for recyclable „left-overs“ – paper, cardboards, plastic, aluminum (a nice word for mainly Coca-Cola and Fanta cans). They are the invisible people. Read more

Oct 25

Show me a little bit of your dance

Theresa Steininger

Can you show me a little bit of what your dance is like? This question, posed once by the French choreographer Jerome Bel to the Thai dancer Pichet Klunchun, then vice versa, is the base of the piece “Pichet Klunchun and Myself”  by Bel. The two performers sit on chairs profile to the audience, facing each other, Bel with pen and paper in hand, when asking Klunchun to present first himself and then elements of Khon dance. Klunchun, dressed all in black and barefoot, rises his foot and stamps loudly, presents arm movements, explaining the differences between the port de bras of the four main characters when being asked by Bel. While watching, Bel often frowns, looks and asks naively as a child, sceptically. Together with Bel, the audience learns about how to show grief and death on a Thai stage, walking slowly and drawing tears on the face with the finger. The spectators are shown how to distinguish between prince and princess and how the feeling „relaxed“ is presented through a headmovement forming an eight. Bel asks the questions we would probably pose ourselves. Playfully, Klunchun includes Bel into his presentation when having him being the one to die when Klunchun shoots an arrow in his direction.

After an hour, the vice-versa-version starts. Now it is Klunchun´s turn to question, what are strong elements of Bel´s performances. When Bel shows him as scene in which he does not do more than looking at the audience, Klunchun openly expresses his disappointment. Bel goes on describing that he does not want to represent something on stage, but to show the audience reality. When then showing death on stage in his interpretation, Bel does karaoke with „Kiling me softly“ and finally drops on the floor. To this, he can relate, says Klunchun, when telling about his mother dying softly.

Throughout the piece, Bel and Klunchun also aim to point out the differences in their cultures, finding very little parallels like the role of the king in the development of the dance, but huge opposite opinion as on getting married before having a child. Still, most of the time is dedicated to exploring and trying to understand the other´s style.

Oct 25

a review i wrote 5 years ago on bel/ klunchun

Maxime Fleuriot

Comments (and critics) are most welcomed :


SOFA – Août 2005

Made in Thailand de J.Bel et Pichet Klunchun

(Présenté à Montpellier Danse et au Festival d’Avignon)

La pièce cosignée par Pichet Klunchun, danseur traditionnel thaïlandais, et Jérôme Bel est le résultat d’une commande passée au chorégraphe français. Tous deux ont décidé de mettre en scène leur rencontre initiale et de révéler l’abîme culturel qui les sépare. L’un est bouddhiste, pratique le « khon », la danse des masques – l’autre répugne à toute technique dansée et questionne les attentes du public. Le spectacle brode et s’amuse autour du thème de l’impossible rencontre (« c’est fou ce que nous sommes différents »). Mais sous couvert de donner la parole à l’autre, Bel orchestre toute la progression du dialogue et assène à son partenaire une leçon de choses sur les bienfaits de son esthétique avec des arguments pas vraiment convaincants. Le chorégraphe français prétend notamment défendre une position politique parce que sa danse pourrait être réalisée par n’importe qui ! Au lieu de répondre à la seule question qui ait quelque peu d’intérêt – pourquoi Bel refuse la danse – celui-ci s’en tient tout le long à une ironie divertissante. A contrario le corps de Pichet Klunchun est pleinement investi lors des trop rares passages dansés de la pièce. Ses mouvements de main sont exécutés avec une précision d’orfèvre. Le contraste entre les deux danses – celle du bouddhiste respectueux de son roi et celle du français athée et rebelle – propose une piste de réflexion intéressante : on aurait la danse de ses convictions religieuses et politiques. Dommage que la pièce se contente d’effleurer la question.

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