Requiem for Detroit? (2010)

One of my all time favorites.

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

I wanted to like this documentary, because it was a great topic (the city) and it really pulled up a lot or research, interviews, footage, and history. It has a title that tells a story in itself, and it is about a city with a story to tell. And, any scene taken in isolation seems really good. It's how it was put together that is a mess.And wow, what a mess this documentary is… (there is not polite word for it) it is a cluster#**k of a story. They took some decent narratives by the people they interviewed, and dropped completely random footage, music, and history over the top of it in no order what-so-ever.If there is any "order" to this mess, it is "things were good, it's bad now. Things were bad, it's bad now. Things were good, it's bad now." If ending with "it's bad now" tells a story, I guess? But, they told this story so horribly, they jumped right from "Paris of the Midwest" to "race riots" to "high center of fashion in the US and children safe an no one had to watch them" without ANY transitions… Just giving extreme examples of raising wages of American workers, to race tension, to WWII hero's, to violent race issues (again), to cultural melting pot, to poverty, back to beacon of culture, … with no transitions or reasons, over and over. Dramatic? YES. Reasonable explanations? No.Sure, Detroit's history is complex. But if this documentary explains it, it's in a way that says "on Monday, Wednesdays, and Friday, Detroit is wealthy, happy, safe, and booming, but on Tuesday and Thursday they are violent and irrational. Oh, but on weekends they were poor but friendly. See how easy it is to understand?" ? WHAT?The documentary does document some of the more epic moments of Detroit's history, but they are pulled so out of context, and mixed up in the weird blender of this director and producer that it's just almost pointless to even watch.

A brilliant 'fly on the wall' p.o.v. (point of view) documentary from a relatively neutral and non-intrusive film-maker/narrator, Julien Temple. While set in Detroit and focused on the history of that city, it could be 'anywhere' USA, Canada, UK, Australia, Europe. Detroit is the star because it is a dissertation on the rise and ultimate decline of a city that embraced the lessons learned from the previous British industrial revolution and when on to create and exploit a revolution of their own (Henry Ford's innovative manufacturing techniques such as the 'assembly-line' which became the ultimate template for most manufacturing etc), blinded by past successes when inevitable change came (various oil-crisis since 1973, demand for smaller, cheaper vehicles, needs for better public transportation). This brilliant documentary could be likened to an onion and peeling back the layers reveals changes that may come in the future to any industrialised nation or city, including China or India with their own unique aspirations and ambitions. This is a documentary that may enlighten and open a window of opportunity to learn from lessons we should have learned from in the past. The only thing to prevent that is our own self-interests, greed, lack of respect for the community around us. On a positive side, the documentary ends on a truly apocryphal note. The ultimate irony when what was once prized high-rise and industrialised real estate reverting back to small-plot farming within the precincts of a city that once swallowed them up. A heart-felt note of praise for the positiveness of impoverished and disenfranchised urban dwellers whose attitudes and desire to survive and re-generate their lives by growing small crops on small plots within their communities. A humble lesson for us all if we allow ourselves to open our minds, our eyes and our hearts to what is now happening around us. Whether it will continue to happen will ultimately be the responsibility of us all, both individually and as a community or society that we chose to live in.

Julien Temple's film about the construction and destruction of Detroit, America's fourth largest city, is a shocking and mind-blowing vision of Man's pursuit of Utopia - in partnership with the Devil. As with much of the American Dream the city was built on a greedy and sinister lie. Lured by the General Motors Company and the promise of work and housing and a regular salary on the production line, people flocked to Detroit from the 1920's onwards in their thousands - many were poor black country folk from the Deep South. Out of the prairie a vast factory was born with high rise buildings, grand houses, five- star hotels, stadiums and theatres, schools, churches, highways and fancy stores selling furs and diamonds. The ownership of a car became not just a dream but a necessity and thus the Consumer Society was born. Segregation was part of the plan and the black folk lived in an area named Black Bottom and the white folk lived as far away as possible. Temple has the facility to educate with images and does not use any political jargon or persuasion. He lets archive footage of the assembly line workers, the race riots of 1967, the huge-finned cars and the society functions speak for itself, and it sure does, with a vengeance. Detroit today is a shambolic ruin, crumbling, gaping, overgrown, broken and battered. It is hard not to believe that Hurricane Katrina has passed by here. The once orderly production like is just a track among columns stripped of copper by local people desperate to earn a few bucks. Trees grow from the fractured roofs of the stately old Department store and theatre. 50,000 homes have been destroyed and thousands remain burnt and vandalised carcasses. But, and this is the most extraordinary thing about the film, out of the ashes a Phoenix is rising. The local people are making a fresh start and some of these people as they talk honestly and with great dignity and wisdom, make one's heart soar and feel hope for mankind. If all the people in Detroit are as remarkable as those found by Temple then a truly wonderful thing will have come out of the dark and deadly times.

Detroit might be anywhere. A city built on promises and wealth from the powers that be that often shape countries. A city left bereft of wealth and promise by the people who created it not so long ago.Temple's documentary is a strong message of what can happen should the worst happen. It reminded me of how reliant we are on the promises of big business and when the power goes out it might not come back on.Having never been to Detroit I wondered how this once burgeoning city, like all cities, could fall and emerge in the modern world like a post-apocalypse disaster town, where anarchy ruled. The word 'apocolypse' comes from ancient Greek and it translates as 'rebirth' (sic) and anarchy in Detroit is not as bad as it seems to Temple, as the city can only pick itself up from rock bottom.The documentary is solid and provides an insight into a city that is the butt of a lot of jokes in the US. This city is no joke if we take the future of capitalism seriously and Temple's Requiem For Detroit will be remembered as a non-sectarian view of capitalism gone awry.