STHLM DANS and film festival Cinema Queer have teamed up to bring you dance films from all around Europe that set the whole world in movement:

Bodiless Things by Wet Mess & Jeanie Crystal (UK)

Horny for confusion, more chaos, more unknown than known, our mannerisms maximized by a thousand. The ego, the bodiless thing, the crotch grabbing, rubbing its quivering flesh against the rough surfaces of the city scape. Wet Mess exposes us to the euphoria and the alienation of oneself in a frenzied yet blasé pursuit of masculinity. A Bodiless Thing takes us on a muscle fuelled carb killing search for belonging, which makes us question to what extent our material existence determines who we think we are and how we fit into the world. Can we really be that horny, sweaty, binary defying, ridiculously camp person beyond our flesh suits? Cum join the escape and get ready for this transcendental mess.

Boléro by Nans Laborde-Jourdàa (France)

Fran (interpreted choreographer and performer Francois Chaignaud) is in his hometown to rest and visit his mother. Following the jerky rhythm of Ravel’s Bolero, this journey along the paths of memory and desire will lead him and the whole village to a joyfully chaotic climax. “Boléro summons the spirits of my teenage years, spent in the Pyrenees, and the way we become ourselves in places that leave little regard for one’s differences. Fran came into himself elsewhere, and as he returns, he yearns for reconciliation. I wanted to show François Chaignaud on screen, how powerful a dancer he is. Each and every movement he makes portends a future earthquake. I wanted to convey not only his art, but his vulnerability and subversive impact.” (Nans Laborde-Jourdàa) 

Marble by Sepideh Khodarahmi & Oscar Hagberg (Sweden)

𝘢 𝘧𝘭𝘪𝘳𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘶𝘴 𝘨𝘩𝘰𝘴𝘵 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘪𝘥𝘰𝘳𝘴
𝘢 𝘵𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘬𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘥𝘳𝘪𝘧𝘵𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘶𝘮; 𝘴𝘦𝘦𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰 𝘪𝘯𝘩𝘢𝘣𝘪𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵, 𝘵𝘰 𝘷𝘪𝘴𝘪𝘵, 𝘵𝘰 𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘦𝘳, 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦

At once ghostly and childlike, clownish and sincere, the film follows a figure in soft rebellion—a kitsch specter, a mischievous presence who slides between the cracks of institutional solemnity.  This flirtatious trickster navigates with haunted tenderness, moving through the space with a sense of both reverence and irreverence. With tactile gestures, slow, exploratory; a ghost trying to remember how to belong in a room made to preserve, to contain. It’s a dance of becoming—a soft haunting that shakes up the stiff codes of display. 𝑴𝑨𝑹𝑩𝑳𝑬 is a film adaptation of Sepideh Khodarahmi’s solo performance ‘My Own Room’ (STHLM DANS 2024). Shot in dialogue with the stony gravitas of the museum’s marble interiors, 𝑴𝑨𝑹𝑩𝑳𝑬 unfolds as a tactile dialogue between body, ghost and building. It’s a site of encounter: between play and history, stillness and movement, ritual and interruption.

[More films TBA]

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