What Are Pina Bausch and Her Dancers Doing in Wuppertal

Wuppertal is a drizzly industrial city on the Rhine and one immediately wonders why Pina Bausch and her avantgarde dance troupe have settled there A socially engaged documentarian Wildenhahn is also perplexed by this issue and spends considerable time trying to place Bausch in a context outside of the aesthetic Still the dance companys daily life and the excruciating rehearsal and performance schedule is solidly captured The film begins cleverly a dance critic offers sagacious comments on ballet dancers finishing their careers at midthirty just when according to Bausch the aspects of misery suffering and fear of death should become an integral part of a dancers spiritual and psychological makeup Wildenhahns camera glides over the dancers bodies as Bausch leads them through their paces a consummate teacher Leaving behind rehearsals of Bandoneón and Walzer Wildenhahn then ventures out into the streets of Wuppertal searching for the dance of the common people