Lost Action: Trace is an experimental dance film about the revolving cycles of human conflict. Celebrated choreographer Crystal Pite and veteran dance filmmakers Marlene Millar & Philip Szporer commit an urgent act of remembrance inspired by fading legacies of WWI. As much as the film is couched in a war narrative, it is also a moving homage to Pite’s mentors and contemporaries, whose lives and short careers are pitted against the fleeting nature of the dance art form. Expressing the notion of the ultimate physical sacrifice, Pite’s soldiers echo the universal lament of the dance world. Combining the raw physicality of athletic power with Theodore Ushev’s hauntingly distinct artwork, the film resonates universal themes of the shared effects of conflict, loss, and rescue we experience as we cycle infinitely through states of love and war. Inspired by Crystal Pite’s internationally-lauded 70-minute dance production, this 4-minute, 3D live action/animation hybrid dance-film is innovating at the crossroads of cinema, animation and dance.

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