In the Upper Room

The Gold Rush

July 1925 •English

A gold prospector in Alaska struggles to survive the elements and win the heart of a dance hall girl.

Kreativ: A Study in Creativity by Alexander Ekman

January 2017 •Swedish

Award-winning choreographer Alexander Ekman dives into the subject of creativity by meeting scientists, professors, artists, film directors and choreographers, with the goal of trying to understand every aspect of the phenomenon.

Dancer

September 2016 •English

Sergei Polunin is a breathtaking ballet talent who questions his existence and his commitment to dance just as he is about to become a legend.

Giselle: Belle of the Ballet

April 2017 •English

Tamara Rojo, dancer and artistic director of English National Ballet, explores Giselle - the first great Romantic ballet, and a defining role for any ballerina. Through two radically contrasting 2016 productions - a traditional 19th-century recreation, and a gritty reimagining of the work by celebrated Anglo-Bangladeshi choreographer Akram Khan - Rojo examines the cultural and social background to the ballet’s genesis in 1840s Paris, and the spiritual themes that have fuelled its success over the last 175 years. Giselle is the story of a young peasant girl who personifies all that is good in life, and ultimately forgives the aristocrat who has seduced and betrayed her. With Giselle, the look and emotional heart of ballet was transformed forever, from mime-based storytelling to a fusion of emotion, music and movement, formulating a tradition that has inspired audiences, dancers and choreographers ever since.

Samsara

December 2024 •

Darta, a man from an impoverished family, is rejected by the wealthy parents of the woman he loves. Desperate, he strikes a bargain with the Monkey King, performing a dark ritual to gain wealth. However, in doing so, he accidentally curses his wife and child to a life of suffering. Rooted in Indonesian mysticism, this universal narrative explores the insatiable hunger to become something one is not and the boundaries one is willing to cross to achieve it.

Les Ballets Trockadero: Volume 1

October 2009 •English

What Are We Doing Here

January 2024 •English

On the last night of their cross-country road trip, two friends from college negotiate the terms and consequences of their potential hookup.

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa

October 2008 •English

Alex, Marty, and other zoo animals find a way to escape from Madagascar when the penguins reassemble a wrecked airplane. The precariously repaired craft stays airborne just long enough to make it to the African continent. There the New Yorkers encounter members of their own species for the first time. Africa proves to be a wild place, but Alex and company wonder if it is better than their Central Park home.

Heaven's Gate

November 1980 •English

Harvard graduate James Averill is the sheriff of prosperous Jackson County, Wyo., when a battle erupts between the area's poverty-stricken immigrants and its wealthy cattle farmers. The politically connected ranch owners fight the immigrants with the help of Nathan Champion, a mercenary competing with Averill for the love of local madam Ella Watson. As the struggle escalates, Averill and Champion begin to question their decisions.

Los posibles

April 2013 •Spanish

Santiago Mitre co-directs his first movement following The Student together with choreographer Onofri Barbato. Although it would have been more accurate to say “his first film-story-adventure-movie-great movie following The Student”, the word movement fits perfectly in Los posibles, the most overwhelmingly kinetic work Argentine cinema has delivered in many, many years. The film deals with the adaptation of a dance show directed by Onofri together with a group of teenagers who came to Casa La Salle, a center of social integration located in González Catán, trying to find some refuge from hardship. Already entitled Los posibles, the piece opened in the La Plata Tacec and was later staged in the AB Hall of the San Martín Cultural Center. Now, it dazzles audiences out of a film screen, with extraordinary muscles and a huge heart: Los posibles is a rhapsody of roughen bodies and torn emotions. Precise and exciting, it’s our own delayed, necessary, and incandescent West Side Story.

A Chair Fit for an Angel

March 2014 •English

For two hundred years, the Shakers have been America's most successful utopian society. While seeking harmony, order and perfection in every aspect of their lives, they built minimalistic furniture and buildings that influenced modern design. The Shakers wrote songs of exquisite beauty and danced to the point of ecstasy during their religious meetings. Inspired by this music and dance, choreographer Tero Saarinen created Borrowed Light, a dance piece about communal life and individual sacrifice. Shot in Finland and the United States, featuring interviews and excerpts from Borrowed Light, this documentary explore the cultural legacy of this religious group devoted to creating heaven on earth.

Blue Juice

September 1995 •English

JC is the hero of the Cornish surfing community. Staring thirty hard in the face, he fears that the wave that has carried him through a prolonged adolescence is heading for the rocks as his girlfriend pressures him for commitment and his friends contemplate growing up.

Off Ground

January 2013 •English

A light grey room. A slender woman of 50 and a 12 year old boy. Joined together like the links of a chain. Changing positions at a constant rate. One flowing movement. Never losing touch with each other. A game played by a mother and her child. A kind of tango. Sound of feet. Breathing. Faint smiles. Until suddenly the woman's hands let go of each other.

Life is Beautiful When You Are in Love

January 1971 •Turkish

Turkish Pollyanna's story.

Bring It On: All or Nothing

July 2006 •English

A transfer student at a rough high school tries joining the cheer-leading squad and finds that she not only has to face off against the head cheerleader, but also against her former school in preparation for a cheer-off competition.

Kuffs

January 1992 •English

George Kuffs didn't finish high-school, just lost his job, and his college-age girlfriend is pregnant. To top it off, George's brother Brad is killed and George inherits Brad's "patrol special" privatized police district and all the problems that come with it.

Beau Travail

May 2000 •French

Foreign Legion officer Galoup recalls his once glorious life, training troops in the Gulf of Djibouti. His existence there was happy, strict and regimented, until the arrival of a promising young recruit, Sentain, plants the seeds of jealousy in Galoup's mind.

Amor y Asfixia

November 2020 •Spanish

Dance becomes a vehicle to show love's different phases. Amor y Asfixia consists of three scenes that seek to dismantle certain social stereotypes linked to the women's body and its role in dance. It's a short film that experiments with the human body to initiate a bigger discussion.

The Walk

March 2024 •English

A commuter waits for a ride under the sweltering Manila heat. As his impatience grows, he sets off on his walk home, putting on a pair of earphones as he begins listening to some music...

Riverdance: The Animated Adventure

May 2021 •English

A young Irish boy named Keegan and Spanish girl named Moya journey into a magical world of the Megaloceros Giganteus who teach them to appreciate Riverdance as a celebration of life. Based on the stage show phenomenon of the same name and featuring Bill Whelan’s multi-platinum Grammy Award-winning music.