I saw Kontakthof during the Holland Festival in 2003, when I worked there for a month, tucked away in the darkness of the main box office. At night, I could see performances, including this beautiful dance with twenty older dancers, a remake from 1978. I still clearly remember the thrill I had in Carré, one of the main theaters in Amsterdam. I knew I saw something special. Not only the concept of the older dancers, or the mere fact of seeing a show in Carré, but most of all it was special because it was a show of the Great Pina: a woman who was so well known, that I felt ashamed for not having seen any of her other performances.
Her Rite of Spring I knew, if only because three years earlier, again during the HF, I had tried to learn as much as possible about the Rite while working at the show ZIngaro. The latest version of Kontakthof was modest and fragile, but The Rite was violently, intense, exhaustive. Even behind my computer screen, I could feel the breath of the dancers, I smelled the earth.
And that happened again a few weeks ago, while sitting in the BAM cinema in Brooklyn, wearing 3D glasses, watching Wim Wenders film about her, for her, Pina. I usually don't like 3D movies that much, since I'm not so interested in the special effect. But in this movie, it was different. It was tactile, with beautiful images, where it felt like you could touch the dancers, as if they were dancing around you. Sometimes, a dress nearly blew in your face, or you had to push away a curtain to see them again. It was like standing beside them.
The images created by Pina herself of course, were very important too in this experience. Improbable situations, like a huge rock on stage, with an endless waterfall next to it, where dancers moved through the water like insects. Or a glass chamber in a forrest, where, when the dancers finally open the doors and ran out, you could smell the trees and the soil, that were only visible through the glass at first. And of course, The Rite.
She's hardly in it, in the film that bears her name. But one of the few things she says is: when there are no more words, dance starts. And with that, she expresses exactly what I felt as I watched.
Me and a friend went to see About Canto, a film about the music piece Canto Ostinato. The film is not about the music itself though, it's about the impact it has had on different people. Which could make an interesting film, if the characters would be interesting. And by that, I don't mean it should include more friends of Dutch actrice Halina Reijn - who had to dance on the Canto in acting school - I am saying that of some of the people that were chosen now, had no interesting Canto story to tell: "I just listened to it when I was little and played with my lego," a student tells us, while sitting behind a grand piano in her tiny student room. Eventually, however, the cinematic choices of director Ramon Gieling were more annoying than the characters and made me and my friend (him in lesser extent) very giggly while the film proceeded.
In a master class Rene Appel (who directed Zij gelooft in mij about the Dutch singer Andre Hazes), said that he never showed what the people in his films talked about. You should not weaken the story with accompanying pictures, he said. Gieling should have attended that master class, because the flashbacks that accompanied the stories in About Canto are absolutely terrible and they are not correct. When the girl talks about lego, you don't let her play with wooden blocks in the flaschback. Furthermore, it seemed that the makers had found a cd with sound effects, and had used them whenever they found it appropriate. Bird sounds. Rain drops. Everything was so loud, it seemed like the sound engineer had glued them on to his microphone.
In each interview, the voice of the director is audible at some point, saying things like: "You told me earlier that you ... (then an anecdote followed) .. can you elaborate on that?" Why does Gieling want to be present in his own film? Why do we need to know he had earlier conversations with his characters? I'd rather hear them tell their stories. Even if they all came down to one same thing: The Canto Ostinato had made a tremendous impression and changed their life. We got that message after three times already.
One of the interesting characters, musicologist Henkjan Honing, was filmed from below, while giving a lecture in an almost empty auditorium of the University of Amsterdam, with some female students scattered in the large room, supposedly looking up to him. The irritation of the camera angles was greater than the attention to his interesting content. The pictures behind researcher Johannes Bentz showed roundabouts - which is what the Canto reminds him of - and were beautiful. Just like the scenes of a roundabout, where at some point it really seems to show how a pedestrian is hit by a car. Is it a joke of the film maker?
Then, at the end, 'the master himself', composer Simeon ten Holt is being interviewd, and again, Gieling refers to earlier discussions. At that time, I already lost my focus and could only stare at the old composer, whose body seemed to be one big blob, which made me wonder if he was wearing a snuggy? When he then - in our opinion slightly irritated - answered Gielings questions, I really believed we got fooled and we were watching one of Wim de Bie's characters. Of course, I can't blame Ten Holt nor Gieling this, but the hilarity that I had slowly built up during the film, now turned into the giggles, which I had not experienced in a long time.
Thanks for that, Ramon Gieling. And my apologies to the other cinema audience.
June 24, 2010 must be the most recorded day ever. Worldwide, people responded to the call of Ridley Scott and Kevin MacDonald, to record a moment of that day, and share it on youtube. They got 4500 hours of material that they turned into the film Life in a Day.
I realized that one day on this world actually takes about 36 hours, from the time it turns 12 AM in the most eastern part of the world, untill it is 11.59 PM at the most western point. I have no idea where that may be, but one of the major candidates for the latter, has recently changed into a candidate for the first.
The day begins in the night, when people are drunk, sleeping, feeding their babies and watch the moon. And while the sun slowly rises and thousands of people put their feet on the floor, coffe gets made in so many different ways, people make breakfast, lovers wake up, the days slowly progresses. Between all the quick cut scenes, abruptly abandoned stories return and you start discovering a fragment of somebodies life.
People answer some simple questions in their own films, that unfold the simplicity of this world. What's in your pocket, is one of these questions. The answers? Money, phones, keys of a Lamborghinis, but also knives, guns, flags of all the countries from the ancestors of a (presumably) autistic woman and nothing. Or a stick of a of the Neem tree, that one can use as a tooth brush.
How simple is life? Some have everything, others nothing. It's simple and unfair. And even though no-one complaints, you can't deny this fact. When asked What do you love?, people answer: 'my family', 'my cat', 'cleaning very dirty things so you can see results', God, the Lord and our Saviour' and 'driving 150 miles an hour with my car'. We are all different, but we;re not. All over the world, people get married, they all eat their own strange foods, and everyone tries to make the best of it. The sick mother, with her battered body and her young son. The Berber and his fourteen children who live in a house without electricity or running water. The American girl whose husband fights in Afghanistan, the Korean guy who cycles the world and who gets emotional by Nepalese flies, because they are just as big as the flies in his home country.
And as the day progresses, and the evening falls, the Love Parade turns into a drama, fires burn down houses, people cry in their bed, the West celebrates life with dancing cheerleaders and half naked women, somewhere fireworks lighten the sky and in other places, a thunder storm does. As the moon rises, and it's 11.58, a girl films herself at the last minute. "I hoped that something special would happen today, so I could show the world that something special happens everyday somewhere. But nothing did. And even so, I still have the feeling that something special has happened.
I tried to remember when I first heard of 'the internet'. Sometime in '98, I created my first email address with a Dutch internet host that long ceased to exist. As with most things, I'm always running way behind the facts. So I joined the Dutch version of facebook, Hyves, when its popularity had already faded, I still use hotmail, it took fifty Facebook invitations before I finally joined and posting blogs online is of course far from being cool. I share part of my life online, sometimes more than others, but have determined my own limits. Sometimes, I wish I was a pioneer, knowing what the next hype will be, so I can take advantage from it and maybe even earn some money with it.
Like Josh Harris, "the greatst internet pioneer you've never heard of", the "Warhol of the Web". Harris started the first online television network, Pseudo.com, with which he tried to create a world that was totally unknown and new then, but nowadays has become reality. Then, he conceived the project Quiet, in which a hundred people were locked up together for thirty days, without having any privacy. Unlike Big Brother, (that started at the same time in the Netherlands) where people had some privacy in the toilet and shower, here everybody was filmed constantly and they could watch each other on screens all the time. According to Harris, this again was a prediction of what our lives would look like in the future. After Harris used others as guinea pigs for his fascinations, for the next project he and his girlfriend were under 24 hour camera surveillance, and their viewers could chat with them and react to their actions. Eventually, the comments of the viewers became more important than their life and relationship, and the anonymous followers drove them apart.
It can all be seen in the documentary We Live in Public, made by Ondi Timoner in 2009, long after Harris moved to another continent, away from the internet and old debts. When his girlfriend left him and their house full of cameras, the amount of online followers dropped from 100 to 15. "I feel useless," Harris said. It made me think about the Postsecret app on my phone. The website provides moving and recognizable moments for thousands of followers on a weekly base. But the phone app has become a world of its own, where people criticize, comment and anonymously threaten eacht other. Made up secrets, threats "heart this and I won't kill myself", photographs of other people with accusing text, it's all there.
Harris predicted a world that has become reality. He was a pioneer and made money by exploiting others and himself, and made ordinary life into a public good. And while I am just as addicted to checking my email and facebook and reading secrets of strangers, I would rather not want to be part of it all. I like the part where I can stay in touch with my friends all over the world, and where secret stories can move me. But I don't like the other side of that world. So instead of leading the world into new undefined areas, I'd rather walk at the end of the line.
Years ago, friends and I went to the movies. We went for dinner before, had some wines and were having a typical 'girls night out'. One of those things that make me shiver a little when I read it, but we were really having a fun night. We didn't know a lot about the film we were about to see, just the name of the director and the leading role. Chattering and joking, we walked in, oblivious about what was about to happen. I suspect that I was the first who started to weep, but gradually, the others followed me with a lot of tears. Afterwards, we sat there, still, holding each others hands. In silence we walked out and drank some more wine. A few months later, I went to see the same movie again. Slightly nervous, with the last melt down still in my memory, but now I knew what was coming. At the same moment, in the first half of the film, I started to cry again, and I could not stop until the end. As I was trying to stuff the pile of paper towels in my pocket, the girl next to me turned to her boy friend and sighed: What a terrible movie, it doesn't relate to anything that can move me.". I decided to never, never, never watch Dancer in the Dark again.
I liked Lars von Triers previous movies though, so when his next one came out, I went to see it. Dogville. In which he managed again to create a terrible world. Afterwards, while trying to forget about it with a strong drink, I decided officially to never see a Von Trier movie again.
But then a few months ago, I found myself in the movie theatre, waiting for his latest movie to start. Melancholia. Again, I was totally unprepared. But this time, I found the painful family situations that always occur humorous. The images were beautiful, the conversations intriguing, the little gestures and looks disturbing. But it was beautiful. Then, the planet took over the lead, and the standard Von Trier drama suddenly became a very exciting film! While the end was rapidly getting closer and got more and more threatening, I wondered how he was going to do this visually. How would he, in line with everything he already did, complete his story in a beautiful and satisfying end? The final scene began, I suspected that this was his solution, Understandable, and beautiful. Melancholic even. But then, he zoomed, and the real end began. After everything turned black, I sat there for ten minutes with my jaw dropped to my knees, staring at the screen. Not knowing what to do or to say. But filled with wonder and amazement, stunned and impressed.
I told myself never to intend again, not to see a Von Trier movie.
Since then, my life has changed. I can't watch the moon, without imagining how it would feel if it were another planet. The sky suddenly seems less peaceful and beautiful. It is an infinite mass of potential trouble. You can't see the danger.
While I slowely walked forward in line, along extremely decorated stalls, eating people and dressed up pilgrims who tried to make music on triangles and tambourines, I wondered why this was considered to be 'gezellig', a Dutch word that is best translated by 'cosy', although it's more than that. People looked with indifferent glances at the stalls at the displayed goods: beaded necklaces, nose flutes, expensive olive oil, those terrible crystal animal figurines and the latest results of the community centres Christmas workshop. Actually, they mainly were making their way to another food stall, the sausage came after the mini cheese fondue, then the marinated mushrooms, the potato cookies, and then crepes, waffles and ice cream with whipped cream. The stalls in between offered a moment of piece to taste the newly acquired taste sensation, before plunging in the next culinary adventure.
The Christmas market.
I grew up with this phenomenon, although the German version is much better and bigger. Maybe that explains my antipathy to this annual ritual. Maybe it's the memory of Christmas, and the forced conviviality that in my case lasted for three days, or that we tried to enforce upon each other, which makes my hair stand on end at the mere thought of it. There probably will be a lot of psychological reasons for my behavior.
But frankly, I think it mostly has to do with the excess, the mindless consumption, and easy marketing that gets so many people to walk in line like sheep in a meadow. Is there a crisis? Are we having hard times? I can't see it. Here, on an estate in Germany, thousands of people pay five euro, just to get into the area where they are going to spend a lot of money on stuff they don't really use.
Although I try not to sound patronizing, and I do not want to condemn the visitors - what's wrong with good food and nice stuff to buy or watch, and hey, you're outside too - I realize that I fail miserably. Because well, I just don't get it. I don't understand that you buy on impulse, I don't understand why it's fun to wait in line for an expensive sausage that can be bought cheaper and probably with better taste, somewhere where there's no line. I don't understand why people don't get annoyed by standing in line, walking in a slow pace, with people behind you that kick your shoes off your heels, and the mustard you suddenly find on your jacket because the guy that just passed you didn't bother to clean his hands.
And what stuck me most: few people looked happy. There was little joy to be seen. Yes, the sellers, they radiated joy, and they added a little more when they saw a potential new buyer coming towards them. And my large group of friends, of which eleven of the twenty had never been to a Christmas market. They were happy too. They danced in the tent where the glühwein was sold, and they enjoyed all the crazy food and trinkets. But hey, they had never been on a German Christmas market before.
Time seems to fly. Has wings. Or disappears into a black hole. Is lost on indefinable 'things'. Slips away unnoticed. Time, in other words, goes too fast. Hours turn into days, and those days suddenly were weeks ago. For three years, I regularly wrote down my thoughts. In recent months, I just could think them. Because the time to write them down, just didn't present itself. Or because I did not make the time to write them down. Since that's the course of time: you have to make it. And then, it might be there. So I took the time to visit Berlin. And to work. To go to see films with friends. To drink coffee. To get inspired. To sit in theatres. I took, in other words, the time to do the things I wanted to do. And writing was just not one of those things.
But that is not entirely true. Because I did write. In my head. A whole series of writings still awaits for the moment that they appear on the screen in front of me. Once in a while, they fight their way forward and suddenly loom in my mind. If they are lucky, they turn into a few words, that one day have to lead to a story. But they are in a long line with other thoughts, that also managed to manifest themselves, and are just as important and scream just as loud for attention. And in the mean time, the strides striding forward, and another week passed, in which still no thoughts are being written down, and the line of stories to write has grown because of new adventures.
Then, suddenly, there is something that makes you realise that you really need to take the time, and that the time is now. The inspiration this time, is not a book by Eckhart Tolle, or a TED Talk about spending valuable time. The inspiration comes from Woody Allen and is wonderful latest film, Midnight in Paris. Where the desire for another time magically becomes a reality, but where the present seems to win. Paris in the Fin the Siecle or in the twenties of last century, opposite the Paris of today. Which is not less good, but maybe less romantic. Because, in the end, some people always long for lost times. Two days before seeing the film, I was in the Van Gogh Museum, and looked at paintings from that same period of the end of the ninteenth century. I saw how Van Gogh painted dark and gray apples in the Netherlands, and how, two years later, influenced by exactly the same Paris, he burst out in colour and feelings.
It's time to get back to work. To choose for the things that are important. It's time to write. To share.
