Elimination Dance

December 15, 2004 12:04 AM

Elimination Dance A quicktime movie based on Michael Ondaatje's poem. "The rules of the dance are simple: if the caller announces a circumstance that has occurred in the lifetime of you or your partner, you must leave the dance floor at once."
posted by dhruva (29 comments total)

damn, here's a better link to the poem.
posted by dhruva at 12:07 AM on December 15, 2004

All sorts of well known (well, that's relative) Canadian actors in there. Cool.
posted by stray at 12:30 AM on December 15, 2004

Damn. Knocked out at the next to last one.
How the hell did he know the LCB didn't have the '85 Lynch Bages ?

Painful, humiliating, almost cruel at times, the Elimination Dance is not for the squeamish.
It's a piece of cake for MeFi noobies.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 12:48 AM on December 15, 2004

Eerie. I was just searching for the image on the cover of Elimination Dance, but with no luck, as I couldn't remember the book's title. After several fruitless Google depth charges, I gave up and decided to head over to Metafilter to waste some more time....
posted by showmethecalvino at 1:10 AM on December 15, 2004

Out by the third one.
posted by Espoo2 at 1:25 AM on December 15, 2004

showmethecalvino: i too have experienced several seemingly random instances of metafilter collective consciousness.
posted by Espoo2 at 1:26 AM on December 15, 2004

It was the Rosicrucians who got me eliminated. I blame Umberto Eco :)
posted by dhruva at 1:31 AM on December 15, 2004

excellent.
posted by kamylyon at 1:33 AM on December 15, 2004

[didn't get eliminated until the last]
posted by kamylyon at 1:34 AM on December 15, 2004

resisted perversion?

jesus, man.. why not just eliminate anybody who's carbon based and be done with it?
posted by Parannoyed at 1:46 AM on December 15, 2004

I know a guy who's into carbon dating.
That's really perverted.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 2:10 AM on December 15, 2004

But he's still dancing. You're eliminated if you have resisted depravity.
Get back out there, Parannoyed!
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 2:29 AM on December 15, 2004

You have to love Don McKellar and Bruce McDonald. Highway 61's a classic of Canadian cinema.

Also, eliminated due to self-staplage.
posted by Simon! at 2:55 AM on December 15, 2004

Crap. I can't be the only one to have mistaken a flasher's penis for a loaf of bread?
posted by Justinian at 3:44 AM on December 15, 2004

I'm telling you, I know that dog and he never could have done what they say he did.
posted by papercake at 6:14 AM on December 15, 2004

The movie is sweet and perverse and oddly moving. I popped a copy onto the ol' hard drive as a contingency. Thanks, dhruva.
posted by cgc373 at 6:48 AM on December 15, 2004

I love Ondaatje, but would it be too much to ask Don McKeller to simply go away already? I believe the country does have other actors.
posted by dobbs at 7:44 AM on December 15, 2004

Did anyone else get terminated eliminated for mistaking the woman wearing a naked woman's body suit as actually being a naked woman while viewing at work?

Can I get a what what NSFW ?
posted by mic stand at 8:01 AM on December 15, 2004

great link, thanks.

And yeah, is probably minorly nsfw.
posted by cmyr at 8:30 AM on December 15, 2004

/me joins Simon! in the autostaplage corner.

Neat movie.
posted by Faint of Butt at 11:20 AM on December 15, 2004

Just to clarify, I, in no way, was upset by the nudity nor did I get in trouble, so don't take offense to my post, just foolin' 'round.
posted by mic stand at 11:40 AM on December 15, 2004

Anyone else having problems with the movie loading?
Anyone have a mirror of the Quicktime file?
posted by rhapsodie at 1:59 PM on December 15, 2004

I first encountered this poem in Harper's 10-15 years ago and became an instant Ondaatje fan. He's best known as the author of "The English Patient" (great novel, bad movie). "Elimination Dance" is in a collection of his poems called "The Cinnamon Peeler", which I've actually been rereading in the last few days.
posted by neuron at 4:16 PM on December 15, 2004

Coming Through Slaughter is better than The English Patient.

dobbs: Yeah, there's also Sarah Polley.
posted by SoftRain at 8:41 PM on December 15, 2004

i love this poem, for a couple (the one about lending someone a book and the person returning it ruined and crappily "fixed" comes to mind) in particular but especially because of the perfect ending. i even own the print version... thank you for this! :D
posted by ifjuly at 1:33 AM on December 16, 2004

Make that three unintentional self-staplers. How many of us are there?
posted by quasistoic at 1:34 AM on December 16, 2004

Unintentional stapler. One of those huge copper ones they use to hold together exploded locomotives or something.
posted by unrepentanthippie at 5:03 AM on December 16, 2004

Count me among the accidental-auto-staplers...I made it that far... But the whippet touching would have gotten me if the stapler hadn't. (isn't that always the way...damn whippets)
posted by Larzarus at 6:43 AM on December 16, 2004

Don't worry, Larzarus, you're safe:
"Men who have never touched a whippet "
posted by quasistoic at 12:59 PM on December 16, 2004