Citizen Jane: Battle for the City

Apr 21, 2017

1h 32m

★ 6.8

Overview

Writer and urban activist Jane Jacobs fights to save historic New York City during the ruthless redevelopment era of urban planner Robert Moses in the 1960s.

Genres

Documentary

Production Companies

Altimeter Films

JustFilms / Ford Foundation

Citizen Jane: Battle for the City Trailers

Cast

Himself

Thomas Campanella

Herself

Mindy Fullilove

Himself

Alexander Garvin

Himself

Paul Goldberger

Himself

Steven Johnson

Himself

Max Page

Herself

Mary Rowe

Himself

Michael Sorkin

Jane Jacobs (voice)

Marisa Tomei

Robert Moses (voice)

Vincent D'Onofrio

Herself (uncredited, archival footage)

Jane Jacobs

Sundance award-winning director Julia Kwan’s documentary Everything Will Be captures the subtle nuances of a culturally diverse neighbourhood—Vancouver’s once thriving Chinatown—in the midst of transformation. The community’s oldest and newest members offer their intimate perspectives on the shifting landscape as they reflect on change, memory and legacy. Night and day, a neon sign that reads "EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE ALRIGHT" looms over Chinatown. Everything is going to be alright, indeed, but the big question is for whom?

4.0

Operation: Jane Walk

Mar 15, 2018

The war zone of a dystopian multiplayer shooting game is used to embark some urban explorers on a winter walk, avoiding the combats whenever possible, as peaceful observers, inhabitants of a digital world, which is a detailed replica of Midtown Manhattan.

No Image Available

0.0

A Capital Plan

Jan 1, 1949

This short documentary features a portrait of Ottawa in the mid-20th century, as the nascent Canadian capital grew with force but without direction. Street congestion, air pollution, and rail traffic were all the negative results of a city that had grown without being properly planned. French architect and urban designer Jacques Gréber stepped in to create a far-sighted plan for the future development of Ottawa. With tracks moved, factories relocated, and neighbourhoods redesigned as separate communities, Ottawa became the capital city of true beauty and dignity we know today.

No Image Available

0.0

Chairs for Lovers

Jan 1, 1973

Architect Stanley King involves the local Vancouver community in urban design.

No Image Available

0.0

A Short History of the Highrise

Sep 30, 2013

“A Short History of the Highrise” is an interactive documentary that explores the 2,500-year global history of vertical living and issues of social equality in an increasingly urbanized world. The centerpiece of the project is four short films. The first three (“Mud,” “Concrete” and “Glass”) draw on The New York Times's extraordinary visual archives, a repository of millions of photographs that have largely been unseen in decades. Each film is intended to evoke a chapter in a storybook, with rhyming narration and photographs brought to life with intricate animation. The fourth chapter (“Home”) comprises images submitted by the public. The interactive experience incorporates the films and, like a visual accordion, allows viewers to dig deeper into the project’s themes with additional archival materials, text and microgames.

0.0

Dorchester: au coeur de la mêlée

Jan 11, 2025

Under Dorchester Square in Montreal lies the cemetery where 55,000 people were buried in the 19th century. The square is still at the heart of social conflicts in Quebec, 150 years later.

0.0

Montréal: The Neighborhood Revived

Apr 16, 1974

This full-length documentary from the Challenge for Change program addresses housing issues affecting Montreal in the mid-1970s. As the city is restoring older apartments through direct action and government subsidies, new, low-rent housing is being integrated into old neighborhoods.

0.0

Alternate Spaces

Dec 15, 2022

A short documentary on the River Ouse, following it downstream from Lewes to Newhaven, meditating on the surrounding area.

0.0

Megalópolis

Nov 4, 2021

Exploration of the territory in a delirious time-space journey through the largest Megalopolis in America.

No Image Available

0.0

Co-op Housing: The Best Move We Ever Made

Jan 1, 1975

Canada is facing a housing crisis, and cooperative housing might be a part of the solution.

10.0

Le Corbusier, l'architecte du bonheur

Dec 31, 1957

Documentary devoted to the architectural and urban planning designs of Le Corbusier. The architect supports his in-depth reflection on the city and its necessary adaptation to modern life with plans, drawings and images, particularly Paris, whose revolutionary development dreamed of by Le Corbusier is exhibited here. Its first projects will remain at the stage of a model: the modernization plan for the city of Algiers. Some will be created by other architects: Ministry of Education in Rio de Janeiro, UN Palace in New York. From the post-war period in less than 10 years, Le Corbusier created large housing units in Marseille, Nantes, a chapel in Ronchamps, a factory in Saint-Dié, a town in Chandigarh in India. Through diagrams, the architect presents his theory of the "radiant city", the mathematical key modulor of his work as well as his project for reorganizing the countryside, industrial and urban cities into a grouping around a cooperative system.

0.0

Together We Cycle

Jun 1, 2022

The film Together we cycle investigates the critical events that has led to the revival of the Dutch cycling culture. For most people, cycling in the Netherlands, seems a natural phenomenon. However, until the 1970s the development of mobility in the Netherlands followed trents across the globe. The bicycle had had its day, and the future belonged to the car. The only thing that had to be done was to adapt cities to the influx of cars. Then Dutch society took a different turn. Against all odds people kept on cycling. The question why this happened in the Netherlands, has not an easy answer. There are many factors, events and circumstances that worked together, both socially and policy-wise. In Together we cycle, key players tell the story of the bumpy road which led to the current state. Where cycling is an obvious choice for most citizens.

No Image Available

0.0

The heart of Caracas

Nov 29, 2013

Caracas has been changing since the nineteenth century this is a story that tries to explain why the Venezuelan capital is complex, chaotic and fertile. In light of these new evidences, community experiments, social awareness and organization of people, seem to be the necessary ingredients to rescue a metropolis that is not yet completely lost.

No Image Available

0.0

Mobility

Jan 1, 1986

This short documentary examines the complex range of issues affecting urban transport in developing countries. After examining cost and available technology, as well as the different needs of the industrialized middle class and the urban poor, the film proposes some surprising solutions.

No Image Available

0.0

Saskatoon: Land and Growth Control

Jan 1, 1974

In the city of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, an effective government policy of controlling land investment prevents speculation, keeps land prices down, and provides a good balance between commercial, residential and public areas.

0.0

Jaime Lerner - Uma História de Sonhos

Sep 8, 2016

No overview available.

10.0

Fernand Pouillon, Une architecture habitée

Jan 1, 2017

In this documentary, Marie-Claire Rubinstein reveals to us, through the testimonies of the inhabitants who live there, the architectural achievements of the French urban planner Fernand Pouillon in Algiers. In particular the vast complexes of hundreds of social housing units, including the most famous Diar E Saâd (1953), Diar El Mahçoul (1954) and Climat de France (1957). The historical context, during the war of independence is related by the historian Benjamin Stora and Nadir Boumaza. This documentary also evokes the personality of Fernand Pouillon in a post-colonial context.

0.0

Brasília

Jan 1, 2011

No overview available.

3.0

The Little Ancestor

Sep 12, 2024

An ancestral house builds itself, comes to life, and shows us its story spanning one hundred fifty years. Through the ages, it allows us to perceive the passage of time.