Joanna Rechnio’s 2024 documentary Pastor: Four Movements explores the life and creative drive of ballet choreographer Krzysztof Pastor. Pastor, a renowned Polish dancer in his own right, teaches at the Dutch Ballet school where Rechnio’s camera follows him as he prepares a group of dancers for a performance. Broken up into the four movements of the title, the viewer watches Pastor move from educator to show producer, mentor to director, while laying out his own journey as a dancer and why he ultimately left ballet behind.
Akin to other ballet documentaries like Pina (2011) or In Balanchine’s Classroom (2021), there’s a focus more on the process of dance and how Pastor enhances his students’ performances. He moves through the group, admitting that he doesn’t plan out routines but choreographs in the moment. For him, he is torn between the world of neoclassicism in ballet vs. modern dance. He admits that he lacked access and education to modern techniques. Pastor narrates the entire documentary with intercut performances of his dancers performing the ballet in its finished form.
Because there are no other talking heads, the viewer gets snatches of who Pastor is, making this less of a straightforward documentary about his life as opposed to an art film pulled along by his choreography. He tells students about how the ballet is akin to his growing up under Communism. “People were still falling in love” despite what was going on in the government. Intercut sequences of a young Pastor dancing in his heyday make an additional connection of how he never let his personal life affect his ability to perform, until one day he decided to walk away in 1995. “I like working alone because I can dream about things…” he says. It isn’t until the final frames that Pastor opens up with any conventional information about his life, saying his father was a doctor and his mother a dentist.
Towards the documentary’s end, Pastor moves away from being the educator of these students and firmly into being a choreographer. He barks out steps and gives notes. Even when a student is trying to go home he stops her to give her more recommendations for how to enhance her performance.
At a quick paced 73 minutes, Pastor: Four Movements is an unconventional and brief documentary about the choreographer’s life. The beautiful balletic dance sequences, and how it showcases creativity through movement, are compelling. But it lacks any significant depth on Pastor’s life, necessitating outside research. Optional Purchase.
Which public library collections should include this dance documentary?
This documentary is a valuable addition to public library shelves in categories such as International Film, Polish Cinema, and Documentary Film Collections. It also complements library resources for media education and film programming focused on European history, life under Communism, or histories of ballet or dance. Libraries that license DVDs or digital films from EPF Media should consider this title for their movie library or home video archive.
What academic subjects or media education courses would benefit from this dance teacher biography?
This documentary could support various subjects including explanations of Neoclassicism or modern dance techniques, Documentary Studies, European Dance History or Documentary Film History. Media librarians curating educational documentaries that highlight dance as an artform, as well as for instructors teaching about the evolution of ballet through personal biography. It can also be played as supplemental material alongside other dance documentaries or in conjunction with biographies on other choreographers.