Educational Media Reviews Online

What do you get when you cross a documentary with a mockumentary? In many cases it might be a faux documentary but Radiant City cleverly manages to create a new type of compilation genre that enhances the documentary aspect of the content with the appropriate amount of dramatic fiction. This is accomplished seamlessly with capable actors and situations so that what is fictional does not stand out from the important non-fiction aspects of the film. The focus of Radiant City is urban/suburban planning in contemporary society and its ramifications on existing neighbourhoods as well as the cultural implications of rethinking urban and suburban sprawl.

The difficulty in recreating a small town environment in a new setting has led to notions of sustainable growth in a new urbanism reverting to pre-war practices. The idealized post-WWII old-town original suburbia seen in some successful projects like Seaside in Florida are not mentioned or discussed in this film but comparisons are made with contemporary suburbia with its deteriorating sense of citizenship and isolation resulting in the disaggregation of daily life. Managing life in the new suburbia necessitates the construction of new “power centers” for the chosen “lifestyle living” of those who flee seeking an idyll but ending up stranded in isolation.

The suburban paradigm of the house turning its back to the street, or public sphere, presenting only garage access as an identifier of human occupancy, creates a kind of monoculture. Older suburbs have downtown traffic without an urban solution as the areas do not densify hard enough to be cost efficient in retrofitting without more radical and green solutions. Thus, the film concludes that economic conditions, the increasingly higher cost of housing, the current energy crisis and demographic pressure may possibly cause a reassessment of the suburban paradigm to occur.

The filmmakers Gary Burns and Jim Brown approach this subject with a sardonic sense of humour which serves them well in dealing with a subject that has spawned sociological and psychological studies as well as environmental concerns. Academic viewpoints are intercut with “interviews” with suburbanite families living with their chosen lifestyle. Recommended for collections held in academic or public libraries in environmental and urban design.