Heavy Architecture

In the midst of the chaos of México City, a group of eight bachelor millennials who call themselves ´The Hermits´, open the doors to their tiny apartments in the historic Ermita Building, in the yet-to-be gentrified neighborhood of Tacubaya, and share their life experiences in a time when precarity changes the way in which we love, feel and relate to each other. As we explore the homes of these eight neighbors, we also witness their personalities intersect in a Whatsapp chat, a virtual space that functions as a supporting system that helps them face the adversities that living alone in this city brings.

Commissioned by MK Gallery, this film combines contemporary footage of public artworks in Milton Keynes with archive footage from the Open University, cartoons from the Milton Keynes Development Corporation's internal newspaper and accounts from early residents, juxtaposing several perspectives on England's most ambitious 'new town'.

The Finnish architect Alvar Aalto (1898–1976) is one of the great figures of modern architecture, ranked alongside Gropius, Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe. This film analyses Aalto’s uniquely successful resolution of the demands and possibilities created by new technology and construction materials with the need to make his buildings sympathetic both to their users and to their natural surroundings. His inventive use of timber in particular represents both a reference to the forest landscape of Finland and a building material that is ‘warm’ and extremely adaptable. Filmed in Finland, Italy, Germany and the USA, this documentary shows how the Finnish natural environment and art traditions were essential elements in Aalto’s pioneering harmonization of technology and nature.

In 1959 Hiroshi Teshigahara shot the following 16 mm footage of he and his father’s first trip to Barcelona and the outlying Catalonian countryside, including a visit to the home of Salvador Dali in Port Lligat. The footage was recorded without sound.

A docu-art film about Kyiv and the contemporary problems of the capital. The film raises the issue of the dilapidated state of Kyiv's old buildings and the search for effective mechanisms to preserve the city's architectural heritage.

Rua de Santa Catarina, a street that was formerly home to dozens of local businesses and hundreds of Porto residents, now sees a crowd of tourists attracted by the cheap, disposable amenities that are popping up everywhere at once. Gentrification has decontextualized Portuguese culture, rendering the landscape uncanny. The Basin Woman, a symbol of the female workers of the historic Bolhão Market, is chased down by seagulls in the midst of this transcendent chaos.

Il n'y aura jamais assez d'images

Fernand Pouillon, du point du jour à l’éclipse

In the vastness of the Iranian desert, young artists strive for freedom, community, and the preservation of their cultural heritage in the ancient caravanserai of Deyr-e Gachin, while facing the harsh conditions of their surroundings.

Tongóbriga (El espíritu de un lugar)

The life of a couple is observed through the home they have left behind.

A biography documentary of the Argentine modernist architect Amancio Williams.

The camera goes back through the alleys and alleys of the community, leading the viewer to compare, with simultaneous shots of 76 and 96, the little or almost nothing that was accomplished, the neglect of the State, the abandonment over the 20 years. Finishing with a virtual image of the colored facades, as part of the proposed urbanization.

Aspects of the city of Congonhas do Campo. The preponderance of baroque architecture, the Basilica of Senhor Bom Jesus de Matozinho, the six chapels on the terrace leading to Morro do Maranhão. Each chapel contains statues representing moments of the Passion of Christ. While in the first chapel there is Santa Ceia figuration, in the second there is the Passo Horto scene. The kiss of betrayal and the imprisonment of Christ before the scene of the third chapel. In the fourth, two scenes are gathered: the coronation and the flagellation. On the fifth, the Christ bears the cross and the crucifixion is featured in the sixth chapel. The twelve apostles of Aleijadinho and the Latin inscriptions of each one. The interior of the Basilica and its main altar, with the figure of the Lord Dead.

After filming the construction site of the Berlitz Palace (2nd), Pierre Chenal shows us in contrast other contemporary architectural achievements which, using the same technical processes, do not sacrifice the structure of iron and concrete for decoration. A documentary to the glory of the modern designs of Mallet-Stevens and Le Corbusier.

Three juxtaposing stories taking place in Portugal, Austria and Cuba create an intimate and poetic portrait of the daily lives and struggles of the elderly in an unstable world, seen through the eyes of their grandchildren.

Bílá Telč

The Gateway Arch: A Reflection of America chronicles for the first time the complete story of this great American symbol… from Thomas Jefferson, Lewis & Clark, and St. Louis’ role in westward expansion; to the eventual construction of the largest stainless steel structure in history.

A man with a perspective like no other on the planet. The leading structural engineer of the World Trade Center oversees its construction, haunted by its fall ever since. A guru in high-rise design. Driven by his values as a pacifist and activist and the woman engineer who emboldened, expanded and ultimately saved the man she loved. About fulfillment, fragility, and a fighting spirit.

Art historian and filmmaker Sundaram Tagore travels in the footsteps of Louis Kahn to discover how the famed American architect built a daringly modern and monumental parliamentary complex in war-torn Bangladesh.