DARK BALLET -story about Butoh-

A film by TAICHI KIMURA

A documentary film about the dark side of Japanese dance culture, Butoh.

My first experience with Ankoku budoh was a short film I made, called ‘Lost Youth’ in 2016. The film opens with an Ankoku budoh dancer at the rooftop expressing the suffering of youth in the city with unpleasant movements. I was extremely fascinated by the unique dance culture and I have built lots of contacts with Ankoku butoh dancers in Tokyo since. What makes Ankoku Butoh interesting to me, is not only the style or how they look during performance, it’s their challenging spirit as artists that attracts me the most.

When Ankoku Butoh appeared in the 1960’s, it has collaborated with many different art forms; music, films, and contemporary art. They pushed the possibility of Japanese-style dancing by embracing the modern elements. Because their challenge involved breaking the original form of traditional Japanese dancing, they have been called ‘rebellions’ and heavily criticised by old fashioned, traditional dancing communities. Today, Ankoku Butoh has been recognised in worldwide and Japanese society accepted its art form.

I want to tell the audience that it is important to keep pushing yourself if you truly believe in what you’re doing, no matter what the society accept or if they are against you throughout the stories and the concept behind Anoku Butoh, because one day people will respect your passion and eventually embrace your actions.

Production : CAVIAR (UK) & CEKAI (JP)
Producer: Taro Mikami
Executive producer: Katie Dolan
DOP: Yutaro Tagawa
Grading: CHEAT

torifune-butoh-sha.com/