Wight Night
The film was a collaboration by two groups of students from Central Saint Martins and The London Contemporary Dance School, and was shot on Bolex 16mm.
The narrative to the screen dance film is loosely based on the legend of the Devil’s Dyke.
The legend says the devil was furious at the conversion of the people of the Weald to Christianity and decided to dig a dyke through the South Downs, so the sea could flow in and drown their villages. To make sure his efforts were not discovered until it was too late, he decided to dig it over a single night. However, his work woke an old woman, who lit a candle. This then woke her cockerel, who began to crow. Seeing the light and hearing the cockerel, the devil was fooled into thinking it was dawn, rushed off with his work uncompleted and the Weald was saved.
Creating a new vision of the story through movement, and playing with the switch in power between the villagers and the devil, the performance concludes with a potential sacrifice and succumbing of the devil’s character.
The idea was to find a way to create a performance that could be connected with the natural surrounding landscape. The history and meaning of the land was a big factor in writing the script.