Los Angeles Plays Itself

Wednesday saw the latest screening in the Architecture Foundation's ‘Architecture on Film’ season at the Barbican in London. Thom Anderson’s ‘Los Angeles Plays Itself’ (2003, US), an essay inviting the audience to think about what has been referred to as Hollywood’s ‘war against modern architecture', reversed the audiences perception of how they have been directed to view film. Bringing out the architectural background of over 200 films featuring the city’s buildings, Anderson let these structures become the subject of the films he cites and instead of alienating them from the cinematic context they were in, analysed their positioning to begin discussion on how they have been manipulated by filmmakers to create all manner of cinematic places.

Further, in commenting on the frequent use of geographical licence in Hollywood cinema (something that is symptomatic of all cinemas), Anderson’s empirical observations of the both generalised and specified L.A. cityscape highlighted how urban spaces are ubiquitous to film. ‘Los Angeles Plays Itself’ lacked conclusion but was after all a call to thought more than a thesis leading to concrete closure. Anderson succeeded in drawing attention to elements of cinematic space that are often over-looked in comparison to plot, editing and other cinematic techniques. An audience consisting of both film-savvy individuals and built environment professionals responded to the film, as the director clearly would have hoped for, with thought and laughter.

The screening was followed by a short presentation by Kodwo Eshun, writer, theorist and founder of the artists collective Otolith Group – whom further highlighted Anderson’s key observations and examples and acted to facilitate the idea that the film was an exercise in opening up a wider reading of space and place on screen.