The Body, The Expression of a Creature’s True Nature

"Butoh: Body on the Edge of Crisis" is a visually striking film portrait shot on location in Japan with the participation of the major Butoh choreographers and their companies. Although Butoh is often viewed as Japan's equivalent of modern dance, in actuality it has little to do with the rational principles of modernism. Butoh is a theater of improvisation which places the personal experiences of the dancer on center-stage. By reestablishing the ancient Japanese connection of dance, music, and masks, and by recalling the Buddhist death dances of rural Japan, Butoh incorporates much traditional theater. At the same time, it is a movement of resistance against the abandonment of traditional culture to a highly organized consumer-oriented society.

This work has been long-awaited as a masterpiece which is not performed in public since it was staged 31 years ago in 1989. This valuable video will be recorded in full and will be released for the first time. The story of a seed that fell to one point on the stage, and a tree that grew bravely and dignifiedly there. Amid the sounds of Tomoe Shizune’s exquisitely beautiful Guitar piece, the dancers’ bodies overflow with life and love of nature.