Swings between violence and comedy: Pina Bausch’s Kontakthof, at Sadler’s Wells, reviewed

When you take in the richness of a Pina Bausch production — the redolent staging, the eloquent, eccentric twists of the choreography — it’s everything and it’s something. Kontakthof, created in 1978, sounds the bell of hopeful passes and freighted expectations, centuries of hearts on the line, desperate to elude solitude. A keystone of her back catalogue, the piece illuminates the convoluted, often rotten thrusts of human desire, with special emphasis on women’s vulnerability in the dating game.

A gramophone pipes out vintage love songs as the ensemble to and fro across a dance hall in Bausch’s standard-issue suits and gowns. The title — a reference to the area of a brothel where johns choose their prostitutes — comes to the fore in the opening scene as the dancers present themselves for inspection one by one. The encounters that ensue reel with double standards. Strut too confidently in your heels and you’re a slut; teeter in them and you’re a wimp.