AILEY (2021) is a special tribute to dance pioneer Alvin Ailey (1931 - 1989), American dancer and choreographer who founded the world-famous Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT) in 1958.
Currently under the artistic direction of Robert Battle, the dance company honored its founder in 2020 by commissioning hip-hop dancer Rennie Harris to create a choreography about his life. That piece is the starting point for Jamila Wignot's poetic documentary in which we see how Ailey fell in love with modern dance as a country boy from Texas and then went on to become America's leading choreographer as he took the ballet and dance world by storm in the late 1950s with his African-American choreography and compositions.
AILEY has become an extraordinary tribute to the eponymous dance pioneer, who fought for a better representation of African-American stories on the theater stages and, above all, wanted to show the beauty of them. The documentary shows footage of such great artistic triumphs as Blue Suite (1958) and Revelations (1960), while never-before-seen archival material sheds new light on Ailey's struggles with his homosexual orientation. For despite achieving worldwide success with the AAADT, the choreographer slept his final days uncertain and alone before dying of aids in New York in 1989.
Alvin Ailey was a visionary artist who found salvation through dance. An immersive profile of ground-breaking and influential choreographer Alvin Ailey, founder of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. Sensorial and archival-rich, Ailey captures the brilliant and enigmatic man who, when confronted by a world that refused to embrace him, was determined to build one that would.
Using never-before-heard audio interviews recorded in the last year of his life, we experience Ailey’s astonishing journey in his words.
