IMAGINE, if you will, a creative collision between the absurdist playwright Eugène Ionesco, dance innovator Pina Bausch, auteur filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard and the video (directed by Toni Basil and David Byrne) for Talking Heads’ 1980 hit Once In A Lifetime. Such is the collaboration evoked (in the mind of this critic, at least) by Dive, the short film released by Scottish Ballet on April 29, International Dance Day.

Created by Sophie Laplane and James Bonas, and directed by Oscar Sansom, the piece’s stated inspiration is the famous shade of blue originated by French artist Yves Klein. Human and humanoid figures, and, in one of many hilarious moments that illuminate this 13-minute film, a domesticated mammal, complement and clash in white and Klein’s startling blue.

The sound of Schubert’s heart-breakingly beautiful Ständchen is accompanied by appropriately lyrical movement. However, this audio-visual harmony is interrupted, Godard-style, by technically savvy, 21st-century jump cuts.

These cuts (or, perhaps, cut-ins) hit us not only with sudden bursts of azure, but also with unexpected, often gloriously comic, juxtapositions in both sound and vision. Imagine a calm, tea-drinking Metallica fan making an instantaneous intervention at a ballet danced to Schubert. Then imagine such moments coming at you, in fabulous variety, again and again.

The movement itself is universally superb, shifting constantly between harmony and dissonance, beauty, sensuality and comedy. There is something vaguely sinister, too, in the blue figure whose head is covered entirely by a mask – it is interesting, given the mandatory mask-wearing of the past 13-and-a-half months, to consider how essential access to facial expression is to our culture.

It would be criminal to divulge the deliciously surprising specifics of the imagery of the piece. Suffice it to say that Dive is a work of refreshing originality and a genuinely cinematic, absolutely invigorating feast for the senses.

So extraordinary and accomplished is Laplane and Bonas’s piece that it seems almost unfair to compare it with Odyssey, a film by Nicholas Shoesmith (choreography) and Ciaran Lyons (direction) which is released on Tuesday. If it stood alone, the movie would, I suspect, attract considerable plaudits. As it is, the stunning ingenuity of Dive is likely to garner the lion’s share of the praise.

THAT said, Odyssey, in which a young, male dancer takes to a (mainly) empty studio space wearing a virtual reality (VI) headset, is an impressive and engaging (almost) 12-minute film. Indeed, like Dive, one of its notable strengths is that it places great emphasis upon the unique powers and possibilities of film, rather than simply filming a choreography created for the stage.

The cutting back and forth between the protagonist’s physical and virtual realities is inherently and compellingly cinematic. At one moment, the VI has the dancer turning in alarmed circles as he is taunted by threatening, crawling human figures. At another, he is charmed by a group of female dancers who surround him. Whether these young women are benign or something more sinister (such as Sirens of an alternative reality) is tantalisingly uncertain.

The piece, which is danced excellently throughout, is accompanied, fittingly, by disconcerting and premonitory electronic music by Craven Faults and Squarepusher.

Taken together, this fine pair of short dance films underlines not only Scottish Ballet’s commitment to contemporary dance, but also its remarkable ability to adapt and innovate in times of crisis.

As we, in the countries of the UK, emerge from pandemic restrictions, dance will return in its natural, live state. However, like the work for film created by Pina Bausch, Dive, in particular, will continue to demand our attention.

Dive (available now) and Odyssey (available from Tuesday May 4) can be watched via the Scottish Ballet website until May 30: scottishballet.co.uk