Can you briefly describe what PINA is about and how you got interested in the subject?
Wim Wenders: PINA is a film about German choreographer Pina Bausch, an hommage to her and a journey through her universe. It is a project that the two of us dreamed about for more than 20 years. Her sudden death ended that dream, but together with her dancers we decided to make the film, after all, no longer as a film with Pina, but as a film for Pina.
When did you know that it would become a documentary?
I never really knew what sort of film this was going to be. Choregraphy as such is fiction, but filming Pina’s work was certainly done with a documentary attitude.
How detailed was the script before shooting?
There was an elaborate concept for the film we were going to make together. When that project became obsolete, I first abandoned it, but then the dancers convinced me that we had to do it, after all, in spite of her death, as our way to saying goodbye and thank you. This new project was started more or less as a journey into the unknown.
In recent years the borders between documentary and fiction have blurred. Where do you see yourself in this development?
Right in the middle. While in fiction formulated recipes seem to take over more and more, I feel that in the documentary field there is a greater freedom for invention than ever. And that genre, I am convinced, will be lifted to a whole new level by 3D and the fact that this new language is now no longer a tool for big budget studio movies alone.
