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Before we ever see a face, closeups of backbones and muscles take over the frame. The body, punished in the pursuit of physical aestheticism, belongs to Nadja (Sarah Grether), a strict ballet teacher. Though her joints ache, she refuses to use a cane. A shot of one of her bleeding toes after a session teaching young girls confirms her masochistic mindset.

From director Isabelle Stever, the provocative, if emotionally inert, German drama “Grand Jeté” — named after a jump in which a ballerina floats midair for an instant — deals with the transgression of the flesh but remains impartial to the actions of its characters, arguing that bodily pleasure and the outcome of said enjoyment don’t abide by the rules of morality.

Stoic to a fault, Nadja lives with a boyfriend whom we only see briefly. One night after visiting her mother, she hangs out with her teenage son Mario (Emil von Schönfels...

Grand Jeté’s director Isabelle Stever on Sarah Nevada Grether, who studied with John Neumeier and was a member of the Stuttgart Ballet. “It was in a way my desired cast for this role because I was looking for a woman that I cannot immediately put in a drawer …” Photo: Constantin Campean

Isabelle Stever’s emotionally complex Grand Jeté, screenplay by Anna Melikova, based on the novel by Anke Stelling and starring Sarah Nevada Grether with Emil von Schönfels and Susanne Bredehöft had its World Premiere at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival. Shot by Constantin Campean and co-produced by Olga Dykhovichnaya is a film of exquisite closeups, from well-worn beige T-strap dancing shoes to hairpins taken out for a ritualistic weigh-in.

Isabelle Stever with Anne-Katrin Titze on Chris Marker: “La Jetée is one of the best short films ever made …”

Ballet dancer Nadja (Sarah Nevada Grether) with injuries...

"You don't know anything about maternal feelings." Altered Innocence has debuted an official US trailer for a strange, icky new German film titled Grand Jeté, the latest from indie filmmaker Isabelle Stever. This first premiered at the 2022 Berlin Film Festival earlier this year and it already opened in Germany earlier this month. In order to concentrate on her career, a ballet teacher lives estranged from her young son, who instead is raised by his grandmother. When she meets him again years later when he is a teenager, and she is now working as a dance instructor, an affection develops that goes far beyond maternal love. Described as a "taboo-shattering" romantic drama that earned plenty of controversy when it first premiered (for obvious reasons), you can check it out if you're curious. Or not. It all just seems like an obvious fantasy and "what if" provocation, rather than anything interesting to consider.

Premiering at Berlinale earlier this year to a controversial response, Isabelle Stever’s Grand Jeté captures a taboo mother-son romance relationship, recalling other daring European dramas like Christophe Honoré’s Ma mère and Bertrand Blier’s Beau Pere. Now picked up by Altered Innocence for a theatrical release beginning in LA on September 20 at Laemmle Royal and coming to VOD on October 25, we’re pleased to exclusively debut the striking trailer.

The film follows Nadja (Sarah Nevada Grether), an aspiring ballerina with the scars to prove it. A masochistic pursuit at her dream career has left her body battered, a map of the tumultuous torture dancers withstand on a daily basis. Working now as a dancing instructor for children, rather than as the dancer she always wanted to be, she decides to visit the adult son she has been estranged from since he was a child. Mario (Emil von Schönfels), raised by his grandmother,...

Altered Innocence has picked up all U.S. rights to Isabelle Stever’s sixth feature film “Grand Jeté” prior to its premiere on Friday in the Panorama section of Berlinale.

The film stars Sarah Nevada Grether as Nadja, a woman who has estranged herself from her young son in order to be able to concentrate on her ballet career. When she meets the son (played by rising star Emil von Schönfels), who grew up with her mother, again after years at a family party, an affection develops that goes far beyond motherly love. A release is planned for late 2022.

The deal was negotiated between Frank Jaffe from Altered Innocence and Matteo Lovadina from Reel Suspects.

Jaffe commented: “Director Isabelle Stever crafts an intense, but yet very intimate and lyrical film about one woman’s obsession with finding love and tranquility after an intense dancing career with an unlikely companion: her own son.