Visual Outcome Reflection: On feasibility

I've been thinking a lot about how feasible this method is for reviewing. It's taken me so long to get this far with storyboards. I don't see how a critic with deadlines would have the time to put something like this together if he/she had to adhere to a news deadline of one or two days after. And no disrespect to anyone, but these critics are a bit older...and very clearly writers. Only writers. Even the content of their writing suggests they stick with exactly what they know: reviews, previews, ballet features or profiles on ballet dancers. They rarely write articles about how ballet intersects with other disciplines. But maybe that's what ballet criticism needs: a few people who are interested in taking the time to explore that. It's a grim thought, but Judith Mackrell of The Guardian won't be at it forever. Someone else will have to step in, hopefully with new ideas.

I recently spoke with Emilia and Linda, the founders of The Ballet Bag, a website devoted to being enthusiastic and informative (in a friendly, open way) about ballet. They don't call themselves critics, but they had a lot of great insight on how ballet criticism works right now. I told them about my idea of wanting more out of a review — how a review could look beyond a performance. And they said it's just a difficult thing to convey in the very limited space that review-writers have. The editorial side of the publications have expectations (even if they are dated) about what a review should look like, and these writers have to adhere to that. The comments sections of reviews (at least on the Guardian and Observer) are where The Ballet Bag ladies say reviews can really take shape, or re-shape. Many times, it will give critics the opportunity to dive deeper into issues they wanted to cover. Mostly, though, I've found that the commenters on Luke Jennings' and Judith Mackrell's reviews either very much agree with everything either reviewer says, or the commenters have absolutely no clue what criticism is anyway (this seems to be a problem with comments sections in general). You have very little opportunity for coherent development of thought. And in the case of these ballet reviews, commenters function as faithful defenders of the writers.

Going back to how writers must adhere to the needs of a publication got me thinking about the piece that I submitted to the Guardian a while back. Judith Mackrell really liked it, but she said it was too literary. I was caught off-guard because I thought my writing about ballet very clearly made good links between ballet and other disciplines, and fairly (in understandable language) explained where ballet stood in current popular culture. And I worked to spell out how ballet had appeared in many different arenas so that more readers might be included. Being told the piece was too literary (okay, maybe it was a different writing style than The Guardian usually prints) made me wonder about the content of the actual reviews. I mean, have you read them? Okay, you probably haven't. But some of the descriptions are just loaded with unreadable or nonsensical or 'flowery' phrases. Take this sentence from a Royal Ballet Triple Bill Review of Ballo della Regina by Luke Jennings:

Nuñez, ravishing in shell-pink chiffon, makes light of the often counterintuitive text, springing on to pointe from steely air-turns, drawing bowstring-taut arabesques out of en dedans pirouettes, and launching into flying, up-tucked pas de chat.

As someone who goes to the ballet, I can understand the want? need? to be specific about steps, but is this how you attract an audience? Is this how you gain readers? I really don't even know what 'en dedans pirouettes' are. And this is in the second paragraph. How about making me feel a little bit more included? If you really want to go there, this feels awfully 'literary' to me.

Anyway, besides the challenge of actually making the film, I wondered about the feasibility of a film-as-review appearing somewhere like The Guardian or Observer. I'm trying to bring in 'fun' or relevant aspects of popular culture — recognizable quotes or images that people can relate to. But that also raises a problem within print journalism: Is using content to create new content plagiarism? In this case, I don't think so because I'll be including a list of references at the end of the film, but the content will not be attributed as the film plays. And if it's on youtube, I say it's fair game. But even thought I'm trying to bring in aspects of popular culture (to the film), would a film be too avant-garde for a publication? How clear do you have to be to reach a section of the mainstream...but still be interesting?