Big Time

2017

Danish

6.5

♡ 8

85%

Kaspar Astrup Schröder Director

Charlie Rose as Himself

Jonathan Durst as Himself

Daniel Libeskind as Himself

Larry Silverstein as Himself

Big Time gets up close with Danish architectural prodigy Bjarke Ingels over a period of six years while he is struggling to complete his largest projects yet, the Manhattan skyscraper W57 and Two World Trade Center.

Brasilia, Contradictions of a New City

1968

Portuguese

7.5

♡ 6

Joaquim Pedro de Andrade Director

Ferreira Gullar as Narrator

In 1967, de Andrade was invited by the Italian company Olivetti to produce a documentary on the new Brazilian capital city of Brasília. Constructed during the latter half of the 1950s and founded in 1960, the city was part of an effort to populate Brazil’s vast interior region and was to be the embodiment of democratic urban planning, free from the class divisions and inequalities that characterize so many metropolises. Unsurprisingly, Brasília, Contradições de uma Cidade Nova (Brasília, Contradictions of a New City, 1968) revealed Brasília to be utopic only for the wealthy, replicating the same social problems present in every Brazilian city. (Senses of Cinema)

Architecture of Infinity

2018

German

6.9

♡ 4

Christoph Schaub Director

Raphael Clamer as Narrator

Jojo Mayer as Self

Cristina Iglésias as Self

Peter Märkli as Self

How can structures, which take up defined, rigid portions of space, make us feel transcendence? How can chapels turn into places of introspection? How can walls grant boundless freedom? Driven by intense childhood impressions, director Christoph Schaub visits extraordinary churches, both ancient and futuristic, and discovers works of art that take him up to the skies and all the way down to the bottom of the ocean. With the help of architects Peter Zumthor, Peter Märkli, and Álvaro Siza Vieira, artists James Turrell and Cristina Iglesias, and drummer Sergé “Jojo” Mayer, he tries to make sense of the world and decipher our spiritual experiences using the seemingly abstract concepts of light, time, rhythm, sound, and shape. The superb cinematography turns this contemplative search into a multi-sensory experience.

Antonio Gaudí

1984

Japanese

7.2

♡ 5

Hiroshi Teshigahara Director

Seiji Miyaguchi as Boada

Isidro Puig Boada as Self

Antoni Gaudí as Subject - Artist

Catalan architect Antonio Gaudí (1852-1926) designed some of the world's most astonishing buildings, interiors, and parks; Japanese director Hiroshi Teshigahara constructed some of the most aesthetically audacious films ever made. With camera work as bold and sensual as the curves of his subject's organic structures, Teshigahara immortalizes Gaudí on film.

Tadao Ando

1988

English

7.9

♡ 3

Michael Blackwood Director

Tadao Andô as Self

Tadao Ando, a self-taught architect, proposes an international architecture that he believes can only be conceived by someone Japanese. His architecture mixes Piranesian drama with contemplative spaces in urban complexes, residences and chapels. This film presents the formative years of his impressive career before he embarked on projects in Europe and the United States.

One Big Home

2016

English

6.4

♡ 1

Thomas Bena Director

Doug Liman as Self

Brendan O'Neill as Self

Jack Reed as Self

David Silverman as Self

On the tiny island of Martha's Vineyard, where presidents and celebrities vacation, trophy homes threaten to destroy the islands unique character. Twelve years in the making, One Big Home follows one carpenters journey to understand the trend toward giant houses. When he feels complicit in wrecking the place he calls home, he takes off his tool belt and picks up a camera.

Blind

2014

Norwegian

6.8

♡ 29

92%

Eskil Vogt Director

Jo S. Refseth as Cinematekansatt

Ellen Dorrit Petersen as Ingrid

Tim Nansen as Lege

Steffen Skau Linnert as Restaurantkelner

Having recently lost her sight, Ingrid retreats to the safety of her home—a place where she can feel in control, alone with her husband and her thoughts. After a while, Ingrid starts to feel the presence of her husband in the flat when he is supposed to be at work. At the same time, her lonely neighbor who has grown tired of even the most extreme pornography shifts his attention to a woman across the street. Ingrid knows about this but her real problems lie within, not beyond the walls of her apartment, and her deepest fears and repressed fantasies soon take over.

Goodbye First Love

2011

French

6.7

♡ 11

83%

loire river and valley

paris, france

Romance

strike

Mia Hansen-Løve Director

Lola Créton as Camille

Yuanchen Zhang as Etudiante architecture

Valérie Bonneton as La mère de Camille

Magne-Håvard Brekke as Lorenz

A 15-year-old discovers the joys and heartaches of first love with an older teen, but in the ensuing years, cannot seem to move past their breakup.

The American Sector

2020

English

7.0

♡ 2

100%

Courtney Stephens Director

A documentary about the concrete sections of the Berlin Wall that have been acquired by institutions or individuals since 1989 and are now scattered across the USA. Cherished or abandoned, they have become silent witnesses to recent history.

The Experimental City

2017

English

6.5

♡ 2

architecture

Documentary

Chad Freidrichs Director

In the 1960s, frustrated by the growing problem of urban pollution, Athelstan Spilhaus, a visionary scientist and futurist comic strip writer, assembled a team of experts to develop a bold experiment: the Minnesota Experimental City (MXC). MXC would be the city of the future, a domed metropolis for 250,000 pioneering residents, built from scratch and using cutting-edge technology to prevent urban sprawl and pollution. Things didn’t quite go as planned, as explored in Chad Friedrichs’ fascinating look back at the would-be city of tomorrow.

Valldaura: A Quarantine Cabin

2022

Spanish

6.7

♡ 1

Manuel Lógar Director

A group of young architects, confined to a forest in Barcelona during the COVID crisis, explore the problems generated by the ambition of wanting to be completely self-sufficient.

Eero Saarinen: The Architect Who Saw the Future

2016

English

7.4

♡ 3

architecture

Biography

Documentary

Peter Rosen Director

Blythe Danner as Aline Saarinen

Peter Franzén as Eero Saarinen

Cesar Pelli as Himsef, architect

Jeffrey J. Osborne as Self - design consultant

Best known for designing National Historic Landmarks such as St. Louis’ iconic Gateway Arch and the General Motors Technical Center, Saarinen also designed New York’s TWA Flight Center at John F. Kennedy International Airport, Yale University’s Ingalls Rink and Morse and Ezra Stiles Colleges, Virginia’s Dulles Airport, and modernist pedestal furniture like the Tulip chair.

L'amatore

2016

Italian

6.5

♡ 1

Maria Mauti Director

Piero Portaluppi as (archive footage)

Giulia Lazzarini as (voice)

The memory of Piero Portaluppi, a Milanese architect who reached the peak of his fame during the 20 years of the Fascist regime, comes back to life, both through the rediscovery of his work today and in a previously unpublished film diary in 16 mm, shot and edited throughout his lifetime. A man of great charm and power, Portaluppi lived through a grandiose but tragic era with ironic detachment, as if dancing across things as he created beauty. History marches on implacably, radically transforming the arena in which the eclectic artist and his large family lived and worked.

Eames: The Architect & The Painter

2011

English

7.1

88%

Jason Cohn Director

James Franco as Self

Paul Schrader as Self

Charles Eames as Self

Jeannine Oppewall as Self

Interviews with the junior designers swept into the 24-7 world of "The Eamery" are the heart of this complex picture of a husband-and-wife creative team that define the era of Mid-Century Modernism. Narrated by James Franco, the film draws from a trove of archival material, primarily the stunning films and photographs produced in mind-boggling volume by Charles, Ray, and their staff during the hyper-creative forty years of the Eames Office.

Bamboo Theatre

2019

Cn

7.2

♡ 2

ritualized cultural performance

Cheung Cheuk Director

This film is a portrait of unique cultural space for Spirits, Gods and People. While permanent theatres are commonly built in most cosmopolitan modern cities, Hong Kong preserves a unique theatrical architecture, a Chinese tradition that has lasted more than a century - Bamboo Theatre.

If You Build It

2013

English

7.2

♡ 1

78%

Patrick Creadon Director

Jamesha Thompson as Self

Eric Wandmacher as Self

Ron Wesson as Self

Cj Robertson as Self

A year in the life of one of America's most innovative classrooms where students design & build to transform their hometown community. The film follows Emily Pilloton and Matt Miller as they teach the fundamentals of design, architecture and construction to a class of high school juniors in rural North Carolina.

Mid-Century

2022

English

3.4

♡ 14

44%

Sonja O'Hara Director

Chelsea Gilligan as Alice Dodgeson M.D.

Bruce Dern as Emil Larson

Stephen Lang as Frederick Banner

Emmy Perry as Hannah

A husband and wife's weekend in a mid-century modern vacation rental turns deadly when the husband discovers the owner is a psychopath with a backyard of buried secrets and designs on his wife.

Petra: Secrets of the Ancient Builders

2019

English

7.3

♡ 3

Thierry Fessard Director

Bert Thomas Morris as Narrator

Laurent Tholbecq as Self - Archaeologist and Historian

Thomas R. Paradise as Self - Geographer and Geologist

David Graf as Self - Historian and Archaeologist

In the heart of the Jordanian desert, the ancient city of Petra is full of mysteries. How was this architectural wonder created over 2,000 years ago? The technical prowess of Petra, an ancient city in southern Jordan, which was a wonder in the middle of the desert.

High-Rise

2015

English

♡ 71

60%

38%

Action

architecture

based on novel or book

Ben Wheatley Director

Sienna Miller as Charlotte

Tom Hiddleston as Laing

Emilia Jones as Vicky

Luke Evans as Wilder

Life for the residents of a tower block begins to run out of control.

The Second Mother

2015

Portuguese

7.8

♡ 7

98%

parent child relationship

woman director

Anna Muylaert Director

Luis Miranda as Antonio Jardineiro

Alex Huszar as Caveira

Anapaula Csernik as Diléia

Bete Dorgam as Janaina

After leaving her daughter Jessica in a small town in Pernambuco to be raised by relatives, Val spends the next 13 years working as a nanny to Fabinho in São Paulo. She has financial stability but has to live with the guilt of having not raised Jessica herself. As Fabinho’s university entrance exams approach, Jessica reappears in her life and seems to want to give her mother a second chance. However, Jessica has not been raised to be a servant and her very existence will turn Val’s routine on its head. With precision and humour, the subtle and powerful forces that keep rigid class structures in place and how the youth may just be the ones to shake it all up.

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Big Time

Brasilia, Contradictions of a New City

Architecture of Infinity

Antonio Gaudí

Tadao Ando

One Big Home

Blind

Goodbye First Love

The American Sector

The Experimental City

Valldaura: A Quarantine Cabin

Eero Saarinen: The Architect Who Saw the Future

L'amatore

Eames: The Architect & The Painter

Bamboo Theatre

If You Build It

Mid-Century

Petra: Secrets of the Ancient Builders

High-Rise

The Second Mother