DOROTEA SAYKALY
DOROTEA SAYKALY

SHE


A sci-fi short FILM

A Vision of Self Through a Sci-Fi Lens

Caught in a room the protagonist, Clarice, unfolds a vision of her own identity through a mirror interrogator.

‘SHE’ is a sci-fi cinematic adaptation born from the solo dance performance of the same name by Dorotea Saykaly. The live performance drew inspiration from Clarice Lispector's 'The Passion According to G.H.' and proposed, through statuesque yet jagged movement and an invasive interview with a phantom interrogator, looking at a questioning body through a female lens. 

Throughout the film, an interrupted and glitched movement quality is juxtaposed with moments of ease and sensuality. The script, pulled from the original solo work, reflects the common superficial modern-day interviews while Clarice grapples with answering reflectively and authentically.

‘SHE’ transcends the ordinary, delving into the breakdown of the psyche and body and attempts through minimalism and simplicity to translate inner conflict into a choreographic and cinematic language. 

As the world stepped into the challenges of the first COVID lockdown in 2020, a remarkable collaboration emerged between Dorotea Saykaly and film director Emil Dam Seidel to transform the live performance into a cinematic experience. The film has since journeyed to 25 festivals across the globe, captivating audiences with its unique blend of dance, narrative, and sci-fi elements.

DOROTEA SAYKALY
DOROTEA SAYKALY
DOROTEA SAYKALY

SELECTED AWARDS / NOMINATIONS

  • Best Dance Film, Echoes Film Festival 2023
  • Best Experimental Film, Touchstone Independent Film Festival 2023
  • Best Experimental Film, Stockholm Independent Film Festival 2023
  • Best Choreography For Film, Dance On Screen Film Festival 2022
  • 2nd Prize, Screen Dance Festival 2022
  • Honourable Mention: Best Experimental Film, Around International Film Festival Barcelona 2022
  • Best Experimental Film, Swedish International Film Festival 2022

“SHE translates the character’s inner conflict into physicality through a choreographic, personal, precise language, away from spectacle, instead original, essential, deliberate, and precise. The choreography has a strong sense of ‘today‘. It conveys doubt powerfully, displacing the audience through contradictions, doubling up of words, of meanings, and of movements.It highlights the connection between word, performance and choreography: the performance of words and the performance of movement are enfolded and entwined in each other.

—Dance on Screen Film Festival 2022 (Graz, AT) 

“SHE has a fresh take on crossover art [...] It draws us into a disturbing and yet intriguing dimension, where fragile minimalism is saturated with enigmatic expressiveness and where movement in its slightest nuances plays a major role. It is a glimpse into the fragility of the human state in the observant eye of the future.

—Screen Dance Festival 2022

Created & Produced by EMIL DAM SEIDEL & DOROTEA SAYKALY
Based on the original solo work SHE by DOROTEA SAYKALY
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Written by DOROTEA SAYKALY 
Adapted for screen by EMIL DAM SEIDEL
Directed by EMIL DAM SEIDEL 
With DOROTEA SAYKALY as Clarice & the Voice of the Sphere 
Choreography DOROTEA SAYKALY
Director of Photography KRISTOFFER ENGHOLM AABO 
Composer LOUIS DUFORT 
Hair & Make up JILL ARNFJORD
Editor TIAGO FELICIANO 
VFX Artist ANDREAS CLAUSEN 
Sound EMIL WOXEN 
1st Assistant Camera EMIL WAD JEPSEN 
Colour grade KRISTOFFER ENGHOLM AABO 
Post production artistic consultant STEFFEN JOHANSEN
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Created with support from the → Danish Agency For Culture & Palaces