Radiant City
Sep. 23rd, 2012 02:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
calzephyrMy art history class watched this locally made movie as part of our theme on place and identity. I thought it was mostly just OK and by the end of the film I felt manipulated as a viewer. About halfway through it becomes apparent that there's something not quite right with the subject of the film, the Moss family, and that the film is more of a mockumentary than a documentary. The title comes from the title of Le Corbusier's 1935 book on urbanism.
Interspersed with scenes from the daily life of the suburban family is commentary from authors and experts on urban planning, including the very amusing James Howard Kunstler, author of The Long Emergency. Less of the family and more of the experts would have been more interesting to me.
Despite being filmed in Calgary, and while parts of the city are recognizable, it is presented as if it could be any city, which was very clever. There's not a single shot of the Calgary Tower and logos are minimized.
I found so many parts of the movie disagreeable though when it became apparent that it was not an objective documentary. A poor connection is made between youth suicide and suburbs in the middle that seemed very misinformed and irrelevant. Even the pseudo-ending was out of place in the narrative.
One of the experts talks while riding an empty bus as if to make a bold statement about how everyone drives everywhere...but it was disingenuous as there are few transit riders anyway when all the kids and adults are at school and work.
The portrayal of the wife and mother as a shrewish, selfish person who tries to hyper organize and micromanage the family was terrible and unfair. This was just one of the stereotypes portrayed in the movie. In comparison the husband is stereotypically cowed; he makes the long commute downtown to keep his wife happy.
Whether on purpose or not, Radiant City pokes a hole in itself when the wife stands in an equally sterile downtown street and explains why she lives in the suburbs. It's the only time the cost of living downtown is mentioned.
It would be far more interesting if a real family had been portrayed. Calgary is unique in that the entire city has always been suburbs - trendy neighbourhoods now considered inner city were, when newly built, an attempt to escape the city. The lots alone in Kensington are worth half a million dollars, and very few average people are privileged enough to be able to afford to build an infill.
It's a shame that the filmmakers, Gary Burns and Jim Brown, never touch on how inner city suburbs are being renewed and, as can be seen on Centre Street North, high density buildings are going up.
Radiant City never really answers all the questions it raises, which may explain the two abrupt endings. It doesn't answer why people live in suburbs except for when stereotypes will work as answers. It barely touches on the fact that municipal planning and homebuilders are responsible for giving the consumers little choice. If you disdain suburbs and assume everyone subscribes to the notion a consumerist nuclear family, you'll like this movie a lot. But if you already live in one, you may be wondering why you never see your own thrifty, community centered and child-free experience reflected.
Interspersed with scenes from the daily life of the suburban family is commentary from authors and experts on urban planning, including the very amusing James Howard Kunstler, author of The Long Emergency. Less of the family and more of the experts would have been more interesting to me.
Despite being filmed in Calgary, and while parts of the city are recognizable, it is presented as if it could be any city, which was very clever. There's not a single shot of the Calgary Tower and logos are minimized.
I found so many parts of the movie disagreeable though when it became apparent that it was not an objective documentary. A poor connection is made between youth suicide and suburbs in the middle that seemed very misinformed and irrelevant. Even the pseudo-ending was out of place in the narrative.
One of the experts talks while riding an empty bus as if to make a bold statement about how everyone drives everywhere...but it was disingenuous as there are few transit riders anyway when all the kids and adults are at school and work.
The portrayal of the wife and mother as a shrewish, selfish person who tries to hyper organize and micromanage the family was terrible and unfair. This was just one of the stereotypes portrayed in the movie. In comparison the husband is stereotypically cowed; he makes the long commute downtown to keep his wife happy.
Whether on purpose or not, Radiant City pokes a hole in itself when the wife stands in an equally sterile downtown street and explains why she lives in the suburbs. It's the only time the cost of living downtown is mentioned.
It would be far more interesting if a real family had been portrayed. Calgary is unique in that the entire city has always been suburbs - trendy neighbourhoods now considered inner city were, when newly built, an attempt to escape the city. The lots alone in Kensington are worth half a million dollars, and very few average people are privileged enough to be able to afford to build an infill.
It's a shame that the filmmakers, Gary Burns and Jim Brown, never touch on how inner city suburbs are being renewed and, as can be seen on Centre Street North, high density buildings are going up.
Radiant City never really answers all the questions it raises, which may explain the two abrupt endings. It doesn't answer why people live in suburbs except for when stereotypes will work as answers. It barely touches on the fact that municipal planning and homebuilders are responsible for giving the consumers little choice. If you disdain suburbs and assume everyone subscribes to the notion a consumerist nuclear family, you'll like this movie a lot. But if you already live in one, you may be wondering why you never see your own thrifty, community centered and child-free experience reflected.
