A documentary by Jody Lee Lipes. Rating unavailable.

Early in Ballet 422, 25-year-old choreographer Justin Peck stands alone in a studio, tentatively trying out steps, stopping to think hard, then trying again. And so it is with the most ephemeral art form: a blur of images bouncing around in one artist’s head that have to be pulled out onto the stage.

Director Jody Lee Lipes’s fly-on-the-wall documentary shows how Peck’s vision gets brought to life through the New York City Ballet over two months. We often see Peck, who was plucked from the corps de ballet for his promise as a choreographer, from behind, in silhouette—walking through New York’s slate-grey streets or watching his dancers rehearse on-stage.

In this way, the doc differs from Frederick Wiseman’s La Danse, about the Paris Opera Ballet: while that captured the vast machinery of an institution, this is essentially about one man’s creative process (with a lot of people’s help).

Peck’s task is daunting. He is going to set a new work to Bohuslav Martinů’s challenging Sinfonietta La Jolla—a piece the orchestra is less than stoked about. (Watch the boyish Peck awkwardly attempt a pep talk with its veteran members.)

Seeing the process unfold is not overly dramatic. A costume designer frets about a skirt’s flare here; the choreographer reworks an elbow movement there. Peck is serious, quiet, and placid throughout. What’s unspoken is the tremendous pressure he must be under—enough to send most people into the fetal position.

You won’t learn a lot about his specific inspiration for Paz de la Jolla here. But die-hard dance fans will enjoy watching the film’s unmediated fragments gradually pull together into a single, glistening piece of art. A huge reason is Peck’s talent for intricate, energetic movement—watch him sculpt the flicks and leaps of star principal dancer Tiler Peck (no relation to Justin). Lipes obviously has an eye: Paz de la Jolla drew raves, and now Peck is resident choreographer at the company—only the second in its history. Not that he’s any less alone in his task of pulling magic out of the ether.