Un jour Pina a demandé...

An excellent companion piece to Wim Wenders' terrific "Pina". Both Wenders and Akerman, two of our best and most iconoclastic filmmakers take very different approaches to Pina Bausch's amazing choreography. Wenders film, made nearly 30 years later is longer and far more visually spectacular, using 3-D images to give us the full sense of space in Bausch's dances. But Akerman's is just as valuable.

In this frustratingly short (1 hour), intimate documentary, she films most of the 'dances' in medium and even close shots, which seems like a bizarre approach to dance, until you realize how much of Bausch's work is also theater, relying on her dancers to also be excellent actors (something discussed briefly in the film). By getting in close, Akerman emphasizes the theatrical and dramatic elements in the works, which are often both funny and deeply moving.

Very much worth seeing, and finally on DVD from Icarus Films.