Evocative and evidentiary : interpreting the city through non-fiction filmmaking

This thesis interrogates the relationship between non-fiction film and urban discourse. It outlines intellectual and visual strategies at play in a selection of non-fiction films that actively assign meaning to the mutual influence of urban form and social processes. In so doing, I identify two overlapping traditions, the evocative and the evidentiary, which classify the applications of filmmaking to the interpretation of cities. The research focuses on two American urban planning films that represent radically different ways of organizing their visual content in order to advocate a specific kind of urban reform: The City (1939) by Willard Van Dyke and Ralph Steiner and The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces (1980) by William H Whyte. Each case requires a thorough contextualization and location with urban studies, planning and film histories. The thesis, therefore, is arranged as a chronological exploration of the antecedents and turning points that explain the difference between these two films' formal strategies and philosophical positions. My analysis begins by linking the kinetic and fragmentary qualities of modernity in art and theory to the earliest experiments in creating moving images on film. It goes on to explore in greater depth the development of a formal cinematic vocabulary for the evocation of urban space. The adaptation of evocative techniques to the political subject matter of regional planning introduces an extended historical and formal analysis of The City that demonstrates how it draws from the diverse elements discussed in the previous chapters and applies them to the planning agenda of Lewis Mumford and the Regional Planning Association of America.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2007

Author dc:creator

• Shepard, Cassim (Cassim Cauldwell)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Lawrence Vale.

• Urban Studies and Planning.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/42063

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/42063