Gothic Bellydance Revelations

[Zamira]

Hi all,

Just got this video Friday and wondered if anyone else had seen it yet.

I was a little worried when the first number started out looking like a homemade 80's rock video, and there was only about one minute of belly dancing at the end, but I think that one was just to set the mood. There are several truly odd numbers, but that's what you expect when you buy a video showcasing gothic bellydance, I guess.

Overall, if you want to see gothic/fusion/experimental belly dance, this video is well worth it because I think there are over 20 different performances. Among the performances are a Mata Hari inspired dance, one that I think is supposed to be a dancing zombie to a song called "Dear Ghoul", one with women dressed in shrouds like ghosts, a battle between a women with wings and one with a skimpy green costume and a sword, a few pretty straight tribal fusion numbers, and one dance with two boa constrictors wrapped around the dancer. I have to say the snake dance bothered me a little, not because I dislike snakes, but because the dancer was shimmying and spinning all over the place, and the snakes looked pretty alarmed to me. I kept thinking if we could hear snakes talk, they'd be yelling, "Hey, get me off this crazy ride!"

One big difference between this and the first Gothic Bellydance video is that almost all the performances are on a stage, not in front of computer generated backgrounds like the performances in the first video.

[resullivan]

Thanks for your views. I got the DVD too, but I haven't had time to watch it. I'm happy that at least I recognize more of the names as gothic/alternative bellydancers.

[mekyria]

thank you for the info zamira, I was contemplating buying this dvd but wanted to know wether it would be like the first gothic bellydance dvd before buying it. Over 20 performances, that's a lot! Is this the dvd with Sarah Skinners Mata Hari performance?

[Zamira]

Yes, it was Sarah Skinner and BellyEssence that did the Mata Hari number. Also, I just skipped through the chapters, and there are 25 performances. I think there were 18 dancers on the main menu, so a lot of them have two performances.