Serpentine Dance

Narcissus

August 1983 •English

In this short film by Norman McLaren, dancers enact the Greek tragedy of Narcissus, the beautiful youth whose excessive self-love condemned him to a trapped existence. Skilfully merging film, dance and music, the film is a compendium of the techniques McLaren acquired over a lifetime of experimentation.

Top Hat

August 1935 •English

Showman Jerry Travers is working for producer Horace Hardwick in London. Jerry demonstrates his new dance steps late one night in Horace's hotel room, much to the annoyance of sleeping Dale Tremont below. She goes upstairs to complain and the two are immediately attracted to each other. Complications arise when Dale mistakes Jerry for Horace.

Fame

May 1980 •English

A chronicle of the lives of several teenagers who attend a New York high school for students gifted in the performing arts.

Nanook of the North

June 1922 •English

This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.

Admiral Cigarette

August 1897 •English

Late 1800s cigarette advertisement produced by Thomas Edison Manufacturing.

Diotima

January 2024 •English

"Dancing is sculpting in time." Diotima captures the fluid grace of two people sculpting time through dance, in a continuous one-take shot around Indy Simin's "Echt in Vorm." Their movements inside, around, and upon the sculpture reveal a simple unity, where shapes, dancers, and their environment are perpetually in motion, blending into an inseparable, seamless harmony of a never-ending dance.

Campus Sleuth

May 1948 •English

A photographer is murdered just outside of where a college dance is being held. The body is discovered by Lee Watson, but promptly disappears, as it's whisked around the campus by an ex-con night watchman. However, he is not the killer, and Freddie, Betty, Dodie, and Lee set out to find the culprit, who managed to put a big damper on the big dance.

The Phantom of the Opera

September 1925 •English

The deformed Phantom who haunts the Paris Opera House causes murder and mayhem in an attempt to make the woman he loves a star.

Colombina Star y su baile del terror

July 2023 •Spanish

The Masseurs

December 1963 •Japanese

Anma (The Masseurs) is a representative and historical work by the creator of Butoh dance, Tatsumi Hijikata in his early period in the 1960s. The film is realized not only as a dance document but also as a Cine-Dance, a term made by Iimura, that is meant to be a choreography of film. The filmmaker "performed" with a camera on the stage in front of the audience. With the main performers: Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno, the film has the highlights such as Butohs of a soldier by Hijikata & a mad woman by Ohno. There is a story of the mad woman, first outcast and ignored, at the end joins to the community through her dance. Inserted descriptions of Anma (The Masseurs) are made for the film by the filmmaker, but were not in the original Butoh. The film, the only document taken of the performance, must be seen for the understanding of Hijikata Butoh and the foundation of Butoh.

Step

July 2017 •English

The senior year of a girls’ high school step team in inner-city Baltimore is documented, as they try to become the first in their families to attend college. The girls strive to make their dancing a success against the backdrop of social unrest in their troubled city.

Appalachian Spring

January 1958 •

A filmed version of Aaron Copland's most famous ballet, with its original star, who also choreographed.

Rize

January 2005 •English

A documentary film that highlights two street derived dance styles, Clowning and Krumping, that came out of the low income neighborhoods of L.A.. Director David LaChapelle interviews each dance crew about how their unique dances evolved. A new and positive activity away from the drugs, guns, and gangs that ruled their neighborhood. A raw film about a growing sub-culture movements in America.

Moving in Time

May 2023 •English

A partnership between Matthew Bourne's New Adventures and Magic Me, the UK's leading intergenerational arts charity, Moving in Time is a heartwarming short dance film based on stories told by residents of St. Fillan's Care Home, many of whom are living with dementia.

Nureyev Unzipped

April 1998 •English

Narrated by Terence Stamp, this TV program documents the life and career of famed ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev, through interviews with friends and colleagues and archive footage.

Indak

August 2019 •Tagalog

This song-and-dance musical follows the journey of an island girl with a natural gift for dancing as she navigates through life in the city to follow her dreams and find love along the way.

Son of Torum

February 1989 •Estonian

In the same vein as Meri's other documentations, this one takes advantage of the glasnost policy to discuss the social and ecologic impact of the Russian oil industry on the natives and the lands they inhabit.

R. F. Outcault Making a Sketch of Buster and Tige

March 1904 •English

Buster Brown creater R.F. Outcault sketches his creation. Part of the Buster Brown series for Edison film studio.

Berlin: Symphony of a Great City

September 1927 •German

A day in the city of Berlin, which experienced an industrial boom in the 1920s, and still provides an insight into the living and working conditions at that time. Germany had just recovered a little from the worst consequences of the First World War, the great economic crisis was still a few years away and Hitler was not yet an issue at the time.

She Stays

May 2024 •Spanish

Throughout a night out in downtown Tijuana, Laura waits for her destiny to arrive.