Post Modern Dance on Screen: Boy

During the 1980s, the BBC and Channel Four developed an interest in the representation of dance on screen. In collaboration with experimental filmmakers and choreographers, they broadcasted a number of different dance series, including Dance on 4, Dancelines, and Dance For Camera.Boy (Rosemary Lee and Peter Anderson, 1995) is said to be ‘a dance film classic’ (Dance For Camera 2, 2008), and is part of the BBC’s second instalment of Dance For Camera. The style of the choreography puts it under the category of Post-Modern Dance, a movement which first emerged during the 1960s and 1970s. The movement rebelled against traditional ideas and assumptions; it departed from rigid syntactical forms like ballet, and moved beyond classical dance genres such as Latin American and Ballroom, in preference for more expressive dance vocabulary.

The choreographer, Anna Haplin, was one of the first to take dance away from the stage, often presenting performances outdoors. Dance was no longer limited to one venue, allowing it to be viewed in many forms. When dance made it to screen, a whole set of new opportunities opened up, in which dance could be given a new form of representation.

The director of Boy, Rosemary Lee, states that by working for television ‘I can draw the viewer right up close and establish an intimacy between viewer and performer in a more complex way’ (Mitoma, 2002, p. 156) than can be done on stage. She and co-director, Peter Anderson, achieved this by using various filmic techniques such as editing and camera angles.

The first shot introduces a boy prowling over a sand dune, which is then followed by an establishing shot that reveals the location as the coast. The sea is associated with freedom and adventure; beyond the sea is an unknown world waiting to do be explored. The boy is alone, so is unimpeded by rules, meaning he has the freedom to do what he wants. In this short film ‘an ordinary boy [turns] into a superhero, as he moves with stealth and grace’ (Dance For Camera 2, 2008). Like all superheroes, he has special powers, which have been rendered by one of the four methods of representation. The boy conjures up ‘his own imaginary world’ (Dance For Camera 2, 2008), in which he transforms into animals through imitation.

The directors use both close-ups and long shots to create a greater impact with the audience. The close-ups are intimate, allowing the spectator to intrude on the boy’s fantasy, but unlike most children at play, his facial expressions do not convey enjoyment, but more a sense of wonder at the world around him. The long shots enhance the sense of freedom when they see the boy running and jumping with vigour. When edited together, the boy appears to be acting on instinct, as if it were natural behaviour. For example, when he is running on all fours, he momentarily stops to sniff the air, as if picking up a scent; when he catches something out of the corner of his eye, he instantly freezes as if he were prey, trying to sense danger.

Through editing, the close-ups and long shots indicate two parallel universes merging: one where the boy is prowling, the other when he is running. The prowling boy watches the running boy, so in effect, he is watching an alternate version of himself. They build up a non-verbal, but dynamic dialogue in which they communicate through post-modern dance. According to Jackie Smart, a lack of ‘verbal text’ in dance, allows ‘a level of freedom from referential meaning’ (Smart, 2001, p. 39). The child’s movements do not convey a specific message, but rather lets him express his ‘ “inner” person, through the body.’

Unlike traditional dance, the performer in Boy does not act out classical dance steps, but is similar to that of Busby Berkley’s films because both depend ‘more on a series of poses rather than any established dance techniques’ (Dodds, 2004, p. 6). Post-modern video dance performances have been criticised for their ‘lack of technique and preponderance of every day activity’, which brings into question whether it ‘can truly be categorised as dance (Smart, p. 38). Birds (David Hinton, 2000) for example, ‘radically calls into question the very notion of “dance film”’ because it is just repetitively edited footage of ‘birds in motion’ (Dodds, p. XIII). Although Boy is not this extreme there is still the question of where the line of definition can be drawn. Like, Birds, Boy also uses repetition, but rather than being a complete syntax to the dance, it is a segment of vocabulary that provides temporal ambiguity. The boy often jumps from sand dunes, but many are just repeated shots of the same jump, shown from different camera angles. On stage, the dancer would jump once, and each spectator would see it from a different angle, depending on where they were sitting. On screen, however, the directors decided to let the audience experience a range of different perspectives. Not only does this enhance the dramatic intensity of the dance, but it also plays with time, as the boy seems to be in a loop. Time is also manipulated through the use of slow motion; it creates a defiance of gravity, as the boy appears to be temporarily flying, breaking the human body’s physical limitations.

‘Dance is characterized by its use of space, time and energy in relationship to movement’ (p. 30); these are factors that can be significantly manipulated through the televisual medium. Lee and Anderson distort time through the editing, space with camera angles and energy through the movement of both the performer and the camera.

The performer ‘is no longer a solid mass but nebulous and intangible’; for example, ‘a close-up of the child’s brisk, wiggling fingers dissolves into a medium shot of him prowling through the sand dunes’ (p. 78). The primal nature of the dance is expressed through these tribalistic hand movements and exaggerated drums sounds when the boy pats the sand. The effect of this brings connotations of freedom, or possibly the casting off of society. Similar to Sergei Eisenstein’s montage collision theory, in which thesis plus anti-thesis equals synthesis, a series of edited scenes in which the boy’s fingers ‘dance’ in a close-up, dissolve into a scene of a flying uniform. The implication could be that the boy is performing magic to cast of rules and impositions.

As he slides down the sand with a vocabulary that imitates a snake, it suggests that he is shedding his skin – his uniform – and going his own way. In a series of quick cut close-ups, he is seen to be fighting the uniform, but the spectator never gets a full view because of the tight framing that hides much of the dancer’s movements. At the end of the performance, the boy eventually picks up the soggy uniform washed up on the shore, swings it round his head to dry it, and then runs away with it down the beach, almost as if he has had his play and is now returning to reality. The directors use the uniform as part of a reflective representation. Reflection only alludes to events outside the world of the dance; there is no denotative meaning in the uniform. It is an ambiguous symbol that will be interpreted differently by every spectator and it is not intended to define what the dance is about.

Sound has a significant impact on the film. Before the establishing shot is even revealed, ambient sounds of birds, the wind, and the crashing waves can be heard. The audience is already aware that the dance is set at the coast, before the location is viewed. The seaside is a typical family holiday destination so it brings an added sense of frivolity to the choreography. Non-diegetic music is juxtaposed to the scene: a violin or fiddle, which is an odd combination because the folk music played would traditionally indicate a countryside setting. The decision might have come from a desire to imply getting back to nature, or returning to a simpler existence. Being one with nature appears to be a constant theme threaded throughout the dance, as can be seen in a later shot, where jungle sounds play over the boy’s imitative movements of a wild animal. The two elements juxtaposed, bring a primal feel to the dance. The boy’s movements are very animalistic; sometimes he spreads his arms out like wings, as if he were a bird, and other times he runs on all fours like a dog. The absence of man-made objects in a serene environment, plus the boy’s animal nature suggests dance goes back to life’s fundamental design. Flapping like a bird also adds to the notion of freedom that the coastal region connotes.

The culmination of Lee and Anderson’s film and dance techniques create a distinctive style. While representation establishes a framework for the dance, style ‘infuses a dance with its particular identity’ (Foster, 1986, p. 88) and clarifies the dance’s position within a culture. Throughout the film, the syntax shifts from fluid movement to staccato poses. Life often works in a similar way; we run through our paces, but are often interrupted by intruding events. Boy’schoreography reflects this; for example, when the boy is running along the coast, he spots his double watching from a distance, and comes to a sudden halt. In another instance, the boy makes patterns in the sand, spots his double, and quickly frames him with his hands. The boy becomes the camera, and the edited reflects his movements with quick, alternating cuts.

The style also relies heavily on mimesis; the boy’s action with his hands, for example, is repeated several times, while phrases such as the boy running across the top of the sand dunes occur several times throughout the dance. The music is also mimetic, in that is keeps returning to the opening sounds of the sea, which emphasizes the importance of location.

The freedom of movement in Boy expresses how childhood should be carte blanche, a time when the imagination can run wild and unencumbered. Lee and Anderson achieve this with a complex parataxis, in which the distortion of time and spatial relations turns a solo performance into a duet, where the boy projects his internal thoughts into a doppelganger.

Dodds, S. 2004, Dance on Screen: Genres and Media from Hollywood to Experimental Art, UK, Palgrave Macmillan

Foster, S. 1988, Reading dancing: bodies and subjects in contemporary American dance, US, Berkeley CA: University of California Press

Mitoma, J. 2002, Envisioning Dance on Film and Video, UK, Routledge

Smart, J. 2001, ‘The Disruptive Dialogue of Dance for the Camera’, UK, Intellect, pp 37-47

Birds, (Original Broadcast Date 29/12/07) directed by David Hinton [DVD recording], UK, BBC

Boy (1995) directed by Rosemary Lee and Peter Anderson, from Dance For Camera 2, 2008 [DVD], US, First Run Features