What an amazing journey! I never felt so close to an actor or actress as I felt to Juliette Binoche. This documentary gives you the very rare opportunity to watch her as herself, the actress, preparing for a dance theatre performance. Her only partner on stage is Akram Khan, an acclaimed dancer. Juliette Binoche is completely new to dancing. The only other people of importance we get to see are an acting coach and a choreographer. The first part of the film shows the preparation of various scenes, try and error, we get to see unbelievable movements, questions and objections on the performance are discussed. Apparently there are moments where Binoche and Khan will be talking. So far we know that the story revolves around a pair, we get to know how they met, how much they love each other and we see some very intense fights as well. The complete dedication of all involved is very present throughout this preparations. After about an hour the rehearsals are over and we shift to the stage. From now on we are about to see a complete performance live in front of an (unseen) audience. Now the puzzle parts from the preparation fall into place and parts we had not seen yet give us the complete story. Both Binoche and Khan are almost the entire time of about 90 minutes (or so it felt) on stage, dancing out the relationship between this two people. What a triumph!!!
This has been taking place 15 years ago, they rehearsed for 6 months and the final play has been performed some 120 times around the world. Juliette Binoche's sister filmed the rehearsals and also one of the last performances of the play. Ms. Binoche now took all this material, edited it and turned it into this wonderful film.
(Watched at the Vienna International Film Festival)
