Wenders’s long-gestating project on choreographer Pina Bausch, a hugely significant figure in the tanztheater movement, was hit with tragedy when she died just days before shooting was due to begin, and so the finished film acts as a celebration of and tribute to a remarkable artist. Focussing more on her work than her biography, Wenders presents extracts from some of her most notable pieces. These thrilling and utterly immersive sequences of movement do more to communicate Bausch’s talent to audiences than any traditional talking heads documentary would, in line with her own famous exhortation, “dance, dance, otherwise we are lost”.

Screening as part of our Wim Wenders: King of the Road season, July 2nd to 31st.