Creature

Asif Kapadia: Creature (GB 2022) with Jeffrey Cirio as Creatures.

2022

Fantasy / Love / Scifi / Dance House Helsinki

Theme: Next Level

Country: United Kingdom

Director: Asif Kapadia

Starring: Jeffrey Cirio, Erina Takahashi, Stina Quagebeur

Production: Uzma Hasan / English National Ballet

Duration: 91 min

Rating: K12

Pannuhalli, Dance House Helsinki, Kaapelitehdas, Love & Anarchy: Helsinki International Film Festival (HIFF), 15 Sep 2023

Inari Ylinen (HIFF 2023): " Dokumenteistaan (Amy, Senna) tunnettu, myös fiktion (The Warrior) puolella menestystä niittänyt Asif Kapadia häikäisee uudella aluevaltauksellaan tanssielokuvan puolelle. Puhdasta pitkää tanssielokuvaa nähdään harvoin huolimatta siitä, että toisena liikkeen taiteena tanssi soveltuu niin luontevasti valkokankaalle. Kapadia sovittaa rohkeasti ja rajoja rikkoen elokuvaksi nykytanssin kärkikoreografeihin lukeutuvan Akram Khanin Englannin kansallisbaletille suunnitteleman tanssiteoksen. "

" Tanssija Jeffrey Cirion upeasti tulkitsema ”olento” on joutunut osaksi julmaa ihmiskoetta pohjoisella tutkimusasemalla. Tohtorien ja sotilaiden joukossa myötätuntoa hänelle osoittaa ainoastaan siivooja Marie (Erina Takahashi). Liikkeen kautta kerrotussa tarinassa on kaikuja Frankensteinista ja Woyzeckista. Kumpaakin teosta on versioitu loputtomiin, mutta nyt on käsillä jotain aivan uutta. "

" Niin Khanin alkuperäisteos kuin elokuvakin sijoittuvat teatterilavalle, mutta perinteisen taltioinnin sijaan nyt tehdään kunnianhimoista tanssielokuvaa. Kameran ja tanssijan liike soljuvat yhdessä, leikkaus ja koreografia limittyvät. Lopputulos on päätähuimaava ja hypnoottinen, kahden taiteenlajin yhteen tuleminen. Jyrisevän soundtrackin säestämä, huikean visuaalinen ja immersiivinen teos on koettava nimenomaan valkokankaalla. " Inari Ylinen

Quoted by HIFF 2023: " Creature is a filmed theatre project, capturing Akram Khan’s English National Ballet work, also entitled Creature, starring the charismatic dancer Jeffrey Cirio as the Creature, thrillingly athletic and physical, every muscle and tendon visible. The Creature is apparently kept captive in some remote army research unit-slash-prison in the snowy wastes, overseen by a cruel figure called the Major (Fabian Reimair), experimented upon by the Doctor (Stina Quagebeur, who has a distinct Nurse Ratched look), but poignantly befriended by a lowly servant or cleaner called Marie, played by Erina Takahashi. (…) " Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian

" The creation is revolutionary. It is the work of a collective – of director Kapadia, choreographer Khan, cinematographer Daniel Landin, editor Sylvie Landra, sound designer Stephen Griffiths, and composer Vincenzo Lamagna existing as a single mass which ebbs and flows in the filmic space. It is therefore also a celebration of British diversity, of dancers and creatives with heritage from across the globe, brought together in a bold artistic front. Creature announces a new frontier for cinema. " Lillian Crawford, Little White Lies

Language: English

Distribution: The Festival Agency

Print source: The Festival Agency

Cinematography: Daniel Landin

Editing: Sylvie Landra

Music: Vincenzo Lamagna

Sound: Vincenzo Lamagna

Costume design: Tim Yip

In collaboration with Tanssin talo (Dance House) and British Embassy Helsinki.

AA: Directed for the screen by Asif Kapadia, a stunning dance movie experience, a breathtaking dystopian space age flight of the imagination covering a universe of the dance experience. Stunning solo performances of Jeffrey Cirio, dramatic ensemble work by the English National Ballet.

For a man of the cinema, there are affinities with the spastic cramps of Jerry Lewis, his existential agony in the universe of modernity. David Byrne in Stop Making Sense. The choreography of action cinema. The surveillance society. The elastic brio. The moonwalk. Wag the dog. Twin Peaks.

It is a battle of survival inside overwhelming electric and magnetic power fields. The world seems to exist inside a teletransportation system. There are power shortages, issues of static, power field failures. Are we on ice station Zebra. Or in outer space. On the last beach. In the Arctic or the Antartic polar circle. On a Moon landing. Echoes are distorted. Beware of electric shocks. Are we extra-terrestrials.

The earliest filmed records are evoked. Edison's atavistic medical documents of epileptic seizures. Visions in the sphere of influence of Dr. Charcot's demonstrations of La Grande Hysterie.

A brutal, primal scene of Totem und Tabu where the Urvater twice rapes a woman and destroys competition. Reminding me also of  Ivo van Hove's production of Don Giovanni in 2023 at the Met. A restaging of an ancient power game, power structure and power play. Resistance is futile.

The contender retrieved from deep freeze. Pas de deux with the lifeless woman. Fury of the universe. Razzle dazzle. A firestorm from the Moon rocket.

The faux-sublime. The inexplicable.