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Floanne Ankah, a "ONE WAY" French dancer in New York, France-Amérique - November 21, 2008
ONE WAY, a performance imagined by Floanne Ankah
One Way, the film shot around the performance happening of French actress and dancer Floanne Ankah, closed the 5th Big Apple Film Festival on Saturday, November 22, in New York.
“One Way is not a narrative, nor a documentary; it is a breath of air.” It’s in these words that Floanne Ankah, an actress and dancer based in New York, describes her first film as director. This short movie brought to a close the Big Apple Film Festival Saturday night, a festival devoted, as its name indicates, to films of the Big Apple.
One Way is an experience that developed in the natural course of events, when Floanne Ankah’s troupe decided to organize an improvised choreographic performance in June in the streets of SoHo, in New York: onlookers, surprised, became audience, sometimes collaborators. “Some acted like nothing was happening,” cheers Floanne Ankah. The improvised interaction between the dancers and the audience soon became the dream of a film that was only supposed to be a souvenir for the team.
Graduate of the Merce Cunningham Dance Studio in 2004, Floanne Ankah, born in France, has lived in New York since 2000, where she is a dancer, choreographer and actor in theater, film and television. She is already working towards other dance films, including “Waterfront Access?”, which will be a dancing homage to the Brooklyn shore.
by Mathilde Schneider
Click here to read article in French
(tranlslation from French by Floanne Ankah, edited by Melanie Gretchen)
Big Apple Film Festival, French Morning - Novembre 17, 2008
Giving an expressive outlet to young New York filmmakers is the ambition of the Big Apple Film Festival, which presents its fifth year edition November 19-22!
Over these four days, more than 90 films will be screened, including a variety of styles and lengths to accomodate everyone's tastes: from short to feature-length, from narrative to documentary, but also animations and innovative films... The only thing in common between all these films: the filmmakers, screenwriters and/or actors all living and working in the Big Apple.
This is the case of Floanne Ankah, an actor/choreographer based in New York since 2000. On Saturday the 22nd, she is showing her debut film as a director: ONE WAY, a short experimental film about an unusual initiative: ten minutes of improvised dance in the heart of SoHo, in front of an audience that doesn’t know the performance is about to happen. With a cast of 8 dancers and actors, and musicians whom she met on the same day in the street, she films this visual performance, ONE WAY, a tribute to the street sign of the same name. The film also has a message, that of consideration for environment, with an inherent criticism of big companies that use ecology as a pretext for respectability.
Much more than an ode to New York cinema, the Big Apple festival is rather a tribute to New York in cinema, seen throughout film initiatives, often small budget, but always passionate. Not many celebrity names announced, but you can expect diversity, new works, alternate taste and, who knows, maybe future great talents of tomorrow…
by Pauline Lebrec
Click here to read article in French
(tranlslation from French by Floanne Ankah, edited by Melanie Gretchen)
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