Jiri Kylian's Car Men (Blu-ray)

This performance-themed compilation release presents three unique dance works choreographed on-stage by Jirí Kylián in various years. It begins with the 2006 Car Men, done in conjunction with director Boris Paval-Conen and shot on location at a coal mine in the Czech Republic, to Bizet music arranged by Hans Otten. That work tells of the "trial of strength" that erupts between love-struck Don José (Karel Hruška), Good Samaritan Micaëla (Gioconda Barbuto), lady-killer Escamillo (David Krügel), and seductress Carmen (Sabine Kupferberg), which culminates in a wild car race. The second production in the set, 1983's Cathédrale Engloutie, takes as its inspiration and source material Claude Debussy's Prelude No. 10 'La Cathédrale engloutie,' about the ancient Breton legend of the village of Ys and its submerged cathedral; Kylián uses the material to tap into the theme of the human soul's eternal conflict, torn between self-imposed laws and a desire or need to break them. Finally, Kylián's 1987 Silent Cries features dancer-vocalist Kupferberg trapped and obscured behind a muddy pane of glass, in a work that constitutes "a search for the inner state," set to Debussy's orchestral work Prélude à l'Après-midi d'un faune.