Sotsgorod: Cities for Utopia (1995)

Original title

Sotsgorod — Steden voor de heilstaat

Directed by

Anna Abrahams

Genre

documentary film

Country

Netherlands

Runtime

1h 32m

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A documentary about Western European architects who designed socialist cities in Siberia in the 1920s and 1930s. It includes interviews with survivors and letters from the deceased, and also shows how people live in those cities today.

reflectivenostalgiccontemplativeinformativeslow-pacedhistoricalthoughtfulobservational

What happens

Sotsgorod: Cities for Utopia (Dutch: Sotsgorod — Steden voor de heilstaat) is a 1996 Dutch documentary film about a group of Western European architects who were invited by the Soviet Union to construct "socialist cities" in Siberia during the late 1920s and early 1930s. The film draws on interviews with some of the last living survivors of the time, including Jan Rutgers (of the Kuzbass Autonomous Industrial Colony), Margarete Lihotzky (Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky of the Ernst May group), and Philipp Tolziner (of the "Bauhaus Brigade"). The film also utilizes letters, articles, and lectures written by those who have already died, including Hans Schmidt, Mart Stam, Johannes van Loghem, and Ernst May. Additionally, the film follows the daily lives of contemporary residents of Magnitogorsk, Orsk, Novokuznetsk, and Kemerovo. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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