What's That Weird Hand Dance Video? Meet Irish Dancers Cleary & Harding.

This wacky and mesmerizing video has been rapidly climbing the viral charts since its debut on YouTube four months ago. A strange song accompanies a man and a woman at a table in front of an oddly decorated wall engaging in a choreographed 'hand dance.'



What is it? Who are these people? If these questions have plagued you like they did me, read on.



It turns out that this video, We Speak No Americano, is from Up & Over It, self-described as "Irish Dance for the Post-pop generation." A collaboration between Suzanne Cleary, Peter Harding and Jonny Reed, Up & Over It aims to stretch the concept of Irish Dance to its limits.





The duo spent four years with Riverdance, after which they toured with Magic of the Dance where they were quickly appointed artistic directors. They now perform as Up & Over It for live audiences and has created a series of videos of their performances as well as some multimedia films produced by Puck Productions. Here's a few more of their videos for you.

Cleary & Harding live in Cardiff 2010, Music: Frankmusik - 3 Little Words:


A multimedia production for Up & Over It Spring 2010:


Here's a reel of behind the scenes, outakes and 'bloopers' if you will. Compiled by Johnny reel they call it their "Best Bits" and it really endears you to Suzanne Cleary and Peter Harding:

Up & Over It

New Narrative Style of Online Documentaries

Announcing the launch of Minimovies.org, a site showcasing unique online documentaries brought to you by The Submarine Channel.

About Minimovies:
A Minimovie is an episodic documentary consisting of 8 to 10 episodes. Episodes are 7 to 10 minutes each. Put together, they form a self-contained story. With MiniMovies SubmarineChannel explores a new narrative and visual style of documentary filmmaking. You can watch the Minimovies here or simply download them to your digital device of choice.

"A Second Life", one of the movies you can view and/or download:
Synopsis:
In January 2007, a man named Molotov Alva disappeared from his California home. Recently, a series of seven video dispatches by a Traveler of the same name have appeared within a popular online world called Second Life. Filmmaker Douglas Gayeton put these video dispatches together into a documentary of seven episodes.

Director:
Douglas Gayeton, director
Douglas Gayeton wrote and directed, together with William Gibson, 'Johnny Mnemonic', the first interactive cd-rom based movie, for Sony Imagesoft. His digital animated series 'Delta State', was named best animated TV series of the year at the 2004 Annecy Film Festival. Gayeton has also created or designed online social networks for such clients as AOL, MSN, Vivendi and Napster.


above: A still from A Second Life



Just launched, minimovies.org has only two movies up right now. But more will be available soon. Below is just some of what's coming:



So be sure to bookmark www.minimovies.org and you can view (or upload, or embed or e-mail) original, creative episodic documentaries. Yet another wonderful creative avenue available to you through the internet.