Rize

The photographer David LaChapelle's 2005 documentary is about two dance forms born in the low-income neighbourhoods of Los Angeles: clowning and krumping. It opens with footage of the 1965 Watts riots and the 1992 Rodney King riots, presenting the dance not as an aesthetic phenomenon but as an answer coming out of a history of violence. The tension between Tommy the Clown, who started clowning, and the younger dancers who broke away to develop krumping is the film's spine. LaChapelle's visual language comes from fashion photography, which is both the film's strength and its problem: the dancers' bodies are photographed with extraordinary beauty, and whether that aestheticising consumes its own subject was argued over. The dancers' own accounts push back against that gaze. Who it's for: viewers interested in the history of street dance, Los Angeles subcultures and documentaries built on movement. Who it's not for: anyone expecting sociological analysis, or uncomfortable with a story of violence and poverty made visually beautiful.