Everyday Activist - Wreck City: An Epilogue For 809 (CUFF 2016)

Posted on Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 11:30 AM

Wreck City: An Epilogue For 809 (CUFF 2016)

Movie Review by Everyday Activist X CalgaryMovies.com

If you knew your work would last for ten days, how much work would you put into it? Many artists have the gift of centering themselves in the moment, whether the piece lasts minutes, as is the case with coffee art or centuries as many sculptures and paintings have. They create reflections of their hearts, souls and environment. In 2013, Calgary witnessed the birth, life and death of the art installation known as Wreck City located in the community of Sunnyside. Ramin Eshraghi-Yazdi creates a beautiful record of the event that we will hopefully see again at Baconfest, Calgary’s tribute to Edmund Bacon and city planning.

Last season at Baconfest, they featured a 2012, Edmonton film called The Avenue, which was about using art and community spirit to revitalize 118 Avenue. Immediately, my mind compared the two and without knowing the back story of the making of Wreck City, The Avenue looks like the better of the two, because it is more polished. As art should, these two films to me accurately reflect the culture of the cities they were about. Edmonton has structure and funding while Calgary has always been “Let’s do this”. The Wreck City documentary brilliantly used a mix of professional and personal footage. The imperfections of the filming within the context of good story telling add an extra dimension to the final product. When you understand how much work went into reviewing the footage and compiling it, Wreck City comes out ahead.

I had heard about Wreck City, but I never ended up going. I’m happy that someone took the time to capture it on film and used the film to explore the opinions of the different parties involved from not only the artists, but from the developers and historical society as well. There is a lot of controversy involved with removing old, inner city buildings that provided residents with cheap rent and access to the downtown with high density, often expensive housing. With Wreck City, the artists had the intention to “Eulogize” the properties so they weren’t forgotten and put a tremendous amount of effort into doing right. They talked to the developers; they received “tips” from by-law officers and they reached out to those in their community who had completed similar projects. As a result thousands of people, including children, came out to enjoy the 10 day exhibition.

Wreck City: An Epilogue for 809 will have its world premiere on April 15th, 2016 at 7:30 pm at the Globe Cinema as part of the Calgary Underground Film Festival. I hope the movie enjoys a similar reception as the actual art installation did.

Calgary Showtimes: Wreck City: An Epilogue For 809 >