LIFE IN MOVEMENT

Those who have attended the screenings of Life In Movement are likely to have been fortunate enough to see Tanja Liedtke’s work in live performance. Those who haven’t been so lucky, I would urge nonetheless to catch a screening where you can, for it is all the same a good way to see a fraction more of arguably Australia’s greatest contemporary dance choreographer. The equivocator applies only because her life was cut short, as Tanja Liedtke was fatally struck by a garbage truck one night as she was out walking, at only twenty-nine years of age. She leaves a repertory of over twenty works. Her only two full-length works feature in Life In Movement, which was made eighteen months after the artist’s death, and follows the final world tour mounted by Liedtke’s partner, Solon Ulbrich, and her original dancers. The performance footage is clear, as is the ongoing grieving for Liedkte–in this particular case, as a partner, dear friend, a daughter and sister. The people we hear from in the film are all intimates, and the film itself is a close, personal tribute to her that while airless and partial has the gravitas of a love letter–and while tears are not optional, once in a while you might have to look away. It is humbling what Ulbrich has chosen to share: most personal and beautiful images of Liedtke, and more vitally, home video footage of her; dancing in the bathroom, working out ideas in the living room of their Sydney apartment. For those acquainted with her work, some of her movements will be familiar, for instance the snaking hips and tick-tock head and fingers. We are fed elegant filmic liaisons between Liedtke’s past and her works that are really very beautiful, and it is possible more beautiful than true. I think it wise to keep in mind while watching that this is a memoir and true in ways that are deeper than objectivity can provide and false by equal measure. There isn’t quite enough of Tanja Liedtke to fill it but it radiates the urgency with which she operated, a mere glimmer of the heat of her internal furnace. And the faith in her from her dancers, speaking more Liedtke than words, is palpable. The film wants us not to forget Liedkte, but it doesn’t go not far enough in elucidating her genius for those who don’t already know of her extraordinary gift for showing the beauty of what was right under your nose. And Liedtke, one of few great choreographers to represent the twenty-first century, let alone Australia, is right under our nose.