Sketches of Frank Gehry (2005)

User Rating:

7.1/10   

Director:

Sydney Pollack

Release Date:

13 September 2006 (France)

Genre:

Documentary | Biography

Plot:

A look at the life and work of the renown architect.

Plot Keywords:

Artist | Architect | Building | Architecture | Museum

Cast

Charles Arnoldi	...	Himself (as Chuck Arnoldi)
Barry Diller	...	Himself
Michael Eisner	...	Himself
Rolf Fehlbaum	...	Himself
Hal Foster	...	Himself (archive footage)
Mildred Friedman	...	Herself
Frank O. Gehry	...	Himself
Bob Geldof	...	Himself
Dennis Hopper	...	Himself
Charles Jencks	...	Himself
Philip Johnson	...	Himself
Thomas Krens	...	Himself
Peter Lewis	...	Himself
Herbert Muschamp	...	Himself
Michael Ovitz	...	Himself
Sydney Pollack	...	Himself
Norman Rosenthal	...	Himself
Edward Ruscha	...	Himself
Esa-Pekka Salonen	...	Himself
Julian Schnabel	...	Himself
Milton Wexler	...	Himself

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for brief strong language.

Runtime:

83 min

Country:

Germany | USA

Language:

English

Colour:

Colour

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

USA:PG-13 | Switzerland:7 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:7 (canton of Vaud) | Singapore:PG | UK:12 | Australia:M | Germany:o.Al.

Filming Locations:

Anaheim ICE - 300 W. Lincoln Avenue, Anaheim, California, USA

Company:

American Masters

Trivia:

The last film (documentary) directed by Sydney Pollack.

Movie Connections:

References Apocalypse Now (1979)

Strong points, weak points

Somehow I expected an exploration of architecture with a movie camera by a real pro, but I was disappointed. Basically this is a fairly conventional documentary with talking heads and static views of buildings – sometimes, it has to be acknowledged, beautifully enlivened by water or reflections of it as well as by the occasional drifting cloud.

The title is not bad. Basically, Sydney Pollack sketches famed architect Frank O. Gehry with his camera (mostly hand-held videocam). It is a bit corny that the movie starts with an extreme close up of a Gehry sketch - or rather a print of a Gehry sketch - which is misleading as the sketches the title refers to are the ones the director makes of his subject. Gehry is Pollack's friend and comes through as a demure, well behaved man I am sure everybody likes to have as a granddad.

The best scenes show Gehry in his studio, brooding over working models, or at the wheel of his car, completely relaxed. We observe a man who has strong memories about his childhood and his youth, who never forgot poverty and the fear of failure and bankruptcy but also fondly remembers people who showed him kindness or gave him insights. His art must somehow come out of these memories and his specific biography. Unfortunately the movie does not make inquiries to go deeper, but maybe that would be asking too much of a documentary.

What I really regret is, that the choice of buildings centers on the later work of the architect. I studied architecture circa 15 years ago. In my memory Gehry is principally honored by schools of architecture for his artistry when finding new formal expressions using cheap everyday materials in new and unexpected ways, for example his studies concerning an artistic use of chain-link fences. I think this „research" work inspired younger architects in Switzerland, e.g. world famous Herzog & de Meuron. Later his buildings became somewhat „slicker" and the materials more exclusive and expensive – the aid of computer design programs probably seduced this architect into creating twisted sculptures and then just blowing them up and out of proportion. At least the movie includes the O'Neill Hay Barn, at San Juan Capistrano, CA, from 1968, a true masterwork in simplicity and possibly a turning point in Gehry's career.

The choice of the people who Pollack interviewed for this movie other than Gehry is not very good and seems a little arbitrary. They don't deliver much additional information about the man and his work – the Europeans (Felix Fehlbaum, Bob Geldof) come off best. The others seem mainly to try to improve their own image. The presence of Gehry's longtime shrink in this movie is somewhat mysterious and inconclusive, as a viewer I had the impression that I was lacking some inside information.

The main problem of the sketches probably consists in the fact that it is not clear what they want to show and explain the viewers (the who, the what or the why) and it proves my suspicion that the exploration of the built world with the medium film or video still has a long way to go.