Less would have been more from modernists

Emotional intensity and technical prowess are the prime assets of Delfos Danza Contemporanea, middle-of-the-road modernists from Mazatlan who brought “Breves Instantes” (Brief Moments) to the REDCAT at Walt Disney Concert Hall on Thursday.

These virtues were desperately needed, for the company’s paucity of choreographic resources made a six-part, 90-minute program seem endless. Delfos never danced when it could flail, and its frenetic body-lashing proved even more repetitive than its reliance on special effects (streams of water and glitter dust as well as video animation) for magical happy endings.

So many pieces lacked movement invention or choreographic development that the dancers’ ability to sustain interest quickly seemed heroic. However, Delfos choreographers did occasionally dare -- for brief moments -- to be simple and even introspective, as in Omar Carrum’s duet “I Was Thinking,” a study of a flawed yet sturdy relationship. Never straining for intensity or significance, Carrum remained content to offer complex, rounded character portraits, lovingly executed.

In “Trio and String,” by company directors Victor Manuel Ruiz and Claudia Lavista, semi-nude dancers in elaborate, pleated paper kimonos looked spectacular. But the costumes imposed severe limitations on the movement, and the piece’s expressive agenda (male aggression and manipulation, female sensuality and victimization) never became as compelling as its sculptural design.

A numbingly schematic look at turbulent relationships, Ruiz’s “About Love and Other Calamities” showed how a need for intimacy yet fear of it bedeviled a hetero couple, a female duo and a male twosome. The piece initially seemed provocative, until you realized that you were going to endure the same feeble ideas and over-the-top anguish three times in a row (four, counting the recapitulation finale).

Ruiz’s “Fracture” and Carrum’s “My Mind in Dust” both used projected paths of light to restrict the freedom of the relentlessly flailing ensemble until all but one of the dancers found their way into some never-never land. In “Aquatic,” Ruiz’s solo for Carrum, video projections of tropical fish replaced the light paths, but the formula remained the same: convulsive body lashing followed by a picturesque apotheosis.

As always, the Delfos dancers stayed way, way above their material. Lavista, Ruiz and Carrum exuded limitless skill and power in multiple showcases. But such prominently cast paragons as Xitlali Pina, Augustin Martinez and Neisma Avila also lent enormous credibility to the evening, as did the fantasy costumes by Luis Armando Castillo and Janeth Berrettini.