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Urbanism (11)
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Angkor, the Lost CityRoger Blais & Morten Parker 1961 12 minA pictorial essay on the ruins of the ancient city of Angkor. The greatest assembly of sculpture the world has ever known--a whole metropolis of palaces and temples, recovered from the jungle. Six hundred monuments, picture-tapestries in stone, and Angkor-Vat, a mile-square temple of grey sandstone, reveal the glories of the Khmers, ancestors of today's Cambodians. -
Co-op Housing: The Best Move We Ever MadeLaura Sky 1975 22 minThe film explores the dimensions of the housing crisis in Canada, the definition of cooperative housing, and its possibilities as described by some of the people who are living in such dwellings today. Here, housing is owned and operated by people as users, not as investors. The film emphasizes an alternative in housing: security of tenure and mutual aid as the owner-families have come to value them.
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Co-op Housing: Getting It TogetherLaura Sky 1975 23 minPeople, housing, funds and expertise: getting them together isn't easy, but it can be done. The film deals with the planning and procedures involved in setting up a co-op, whether that means building one, or buying and rehabilitating existing housing. People living in different kinds of co-ops talk about them, and how they function.
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Chairs for LoversBarrie Howells 1973 28 minIn this documentary short, Vancouver architect Stanley King demonstrates his method for involving the public in urban design. Called the "draw-in/design-in”, the method is applied to a downtown Vancouver area slated for redevelopment. How can it be made to best serve the needs of the people who will use it? Here, sketches prepared by students and refined by adults are used to guide city planners.
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The Coldspring ProjectPierre Letarte & Kenneth McCready 1974 27 minThe human side of town planning, as exemplified in Baltimore, Maryland. The Coldspring Project concerned a proposed housing development for lower and upper income levels on a three hundred-acre site adjoining a wildlife sanctuary. The film records the differences aired in meetings of various interest groups that tried to modify the plan according to their views, and the compromise reached, based on plans drawn up by Montréal architect Moishe Safdie.
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City Out of TimeColin Low 1959 15 minThis Colin Low documentary from 1959 depicts Venice in all its splendor. In the tradition of Venetian painter Canaletto, the film captures the great Italian city’s elusive beauty and fabled landscapes, where spired churches and turreted palaces soar into a blue Mediterranean sky. Narration by William Shatner.
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Les Habitations Jeanne-ManceEugene Boyko 1963 13 minOverpopulation, slum housing, widespread illness and criminal behaviour were the norm. Now Montréal, collaborating with the federal and provincial governments in its first slum redevelopment project, has replaced this with clean, low-density housing--Les Habitations Jeanne-Mance.
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The Innocent DoorKenneth McCready 1973 29 minThis short documentary affords us an unusual and privileged view of the old city of Jerusalem, before and after the redevelopment of certain key sectors took place in the early 1970s. The man appointed to try to reconcile the need for change with traditional values is Montreal architect Moshe Safdie. His plans, shown in scale models, are in harmony with ancient architecture and encompass the “innocent doorways” that lead from walled streets to pleasant courtyards.
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"I Don't Think It's Meant for Us ..."Kathleen Shannon 1971 32 minTenants of public housing express some of their concerns and perceptions of the public housing positions of federal, provincial and municipal levels of government who make and administer policies that affect their lives. Controversial viewpoints, which will be useful in constructive discussion, are expressed.
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InventionMark Lewis 2015 1 h 27 minShot in Paris, Sao Paulo and Toronto, Invention is a first feature length film by Mark Lewis. From famous corners of the Louvre Museum to the modernist buildings of Oscar Niemeyer in Brazil and Mies van der Rohe in Canada, Lewis takes us on a dynamic tour of fluctuating cityscapes, capturing the texture of these places, their landmarks, and the people who inhabit their streets and buildings, with images of glass, light, reflections, concrete, spiral staircases – and paintings. An homage to the City Symphony films of the 1920s, Invention offers a searching love letter to urban spaces, art and cinema.
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Montréal - The Neighborhood RevivedMichel Régnier 1974 56 minThis full-length documentary from the Challenge for Change program addresses housing issues affecting Montreal in the mid-1970s. As the city is restoring older apartments through direct action and government subsidies, new, low-rent housing is being integrated into old neighborhoods.
