Le Grand Bal evokes joy of communal dance

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From there, it’s up to you how far you want to work on your technique. “Some steps you can do thousands of times and there’s still room for improvement,” Carton says. “But you don’t need to be a perfect dancer. You can find a lot of pleasure with a very basic one, two, three.”

It’s a philosophy that could be applied not only to dance, but to many spheres of life where some specialised knowledge is needed in order to participate, and where individual desires must be integrated into a larger whole. “I wouldn’t call it a movie on dance,” Carton agrees. “To me this movie is really about human relationships and connecting, and how a huge, big group can become like one body, sharing the same breath.”

Ultimately, she says, her desire wasn’t to idealise the Grand Bal, but to show how “the best and the worst” in human nature can be present at the same time. By her account, the bulk of the film was shot in mid-2016, well before the Harvey Weinstein scandal and everything that has followed. Yet she spontaneously brings up Weinstein’s name, suggesting that even then the theme of sexual harassment was on her mind.

Certainly, there’s no lack of topical resonance to a scene where a group of young women discuss the discomfort they feel in dancing with older men who can’t be counted on to behave themselves. In response, some older women voice their own frustrations at being passed over by these same men in favour of younger partners.

Carton suggests that in such scenes the ball can be taken as a microcosm of French society. “It is a protective place, and people mean well and relate and exchange and it’s peaceful and all that, but you still have the same tensions and stakes and issues.” Dancing, in other words, isn’t just about dancing: knowing your way about physically is only one aspect of a larger game where the rules are subject to constant, unspoken negotiation.

Article source: http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/story/1137277.html?CMP=OTC-RSS