Dance in Film · 1953
Dance in the Sun (1953)
Shirley Clarke turns Daniel Nagrin's solo into a foundational lesson in film-specific choreography: match cuts carry his 1950 modern-dance work between a New York rehearsal studio and Jones Beach without breaking the phrase.
Dance in the Sun is a 1953 dance film centred on ballroom and social dance. For dancers, it's a chance to see the style performed on screen — the phrasing, partnering, and musicality that the same dances carry onto a real floor.
Jump to the 3 indexed dance sequences ↓
Where to watch: Streaming by subscription on the Criterion Channel; availability verified 2026-08-06.
Watch it in full
The complete work, on the rights holder's official channel.
The dance sequences in Dance in the Sun
3 sequences — what is danced, by whom, and where to find it.
Seaside port-de-bras and airborne jumps
American Modern DanceDanced by Daniel Nagrin · Choreography Daniel Nagrin
Nagrin opening his arms and suspending large jumps against the beach and sky.
On the beach, broad port-de-bras and large jumps expand into the landscape and seem to hang in the air, making freedom legible through scale, suspension, and the contrast with the earlier studio.
Open the film at this point · Stream or rental only — the timestamp is for when you have it playing. Criterion Channel was opened 2026-08-13 and lists subscription streaming with a 07:03 runtime. LA Dance Chronicle and LA Filmforum identify a 6:47 16mm-derived version; timestamps are therefore withheld. The schema has no subscription enum, so rental is used. An official Daniel Nagrin Foundation YouTube result could not be opened, so no clip URL was written.
Studio rehearsal and conch-shell reverie
American Modern DanceDanced by Daniel Nagrin · Choreography Daniel Nagrin
Nagrin pausing over a conch shell as the studio rehearsal starts to become a seaside reverie.
The film begins from ordinary rehearsal labor: Nagrin dances beside an accompanist, then the conch shell becomes the imaginative hinge that opens the confined studio toward another world.
Open the film at this point · Stream or rental only — the timestamp is for when you have it playing. Criterion Channel was opened 2026-08-13 and lists subscription streaming with a 07:03 runtime. LA Dance Chronicle and LA Filmforum identify a 6:47 16mm-derived version; timestamps are therefore withheld. The schema has no subscription enum, so rental is used. An official Daniel Nagrin Foundation YouTube result could not be opened, so no clip URL was written.
Studio-to-beach match-cut transformation
American Modern DanceDanced by Daniel Nagrin · Choreography Daniel Nagrin
Nagrin’s movement continuing across cuts from the interior rehearsal to open sand and sky.
Clarke edits continuous movement across studio and beach, making the cut itself choreographic: the same dancer and phrase appear to cross space instead of merely being documented from a new location.
Open the film at this point · Stream or rental only — the timestamp is for when you have it playing. Criterion Channel was opened 2026-08-13 and lists subscription streaming with a 07:03 runtime. LA Dance Chronicle and LA Filmforum identify a 6:47 16mm-derived version; timestamps are therefore withheld. The schema has no subscription enum, so rental is used. An official Daniel Nagrin Foundation YouTube result could not be opened, so no clip URL was written.
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