"harS" - choreography by Aydın Teker (2008)

"harS" by Aydın Teker was last night's wonderful discovery. It's a minimalist dance piece involving a harp, a dancer, and the silent void that surrounds them. Every sound, every move, every new discovery matters. Hints of imagery(some violent, some elegant) are scattered troughout but it's hard to find a center--assuming that it exists at all. The lack of narrative drive is also telling. Teker uses the intriguing imagery of a dancer and a harp as a starting point: The slowness of the piece leaves her audiance time to reflect, discover, ask questions of all kinds, and above all to meditate. Just like the dancer on the stage.

Entre Les Murs (2008)

Laurent Cantet's "Entre Les Murs" is an inspring cinematic experience. The entire movie literally takes place "entre les murs", with the characters point of views colliding in close-ups. Cantet looks at his all too-familiar material with wide-open eyes, like a scientist. But who is the subject of this experiment? The students, the teachers, or just about everyone involed? In fact, the very abstraction of the film(or the experiment) seems to question itself: What about beyond "les murs"? Is it even possible to find answers when the truth is so much more complicated(and possibly beyond rationality)?

Finally, the most important question of all: What about the prices on that new coffee machine?