Stations of the Elevated
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''Stations of the Elevated'' is a 1981
documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...
by Manfred Kirchheimer about
graffiti in New York City Graffiti in New York City has had a substantial local, national, and international influence. Originating in Philadelphia and spreading to the New York City Subway and beyond, graffiti is among the most common forms of vandalism committed today. ...
. It debuted at the
New York Film Festival The New York Film Festival (NYFF) is a film festival held every fall in New York City, presented by Film at Lincoln Center (FLC). Founded in 1963 by Richard Roud and Amos Vogel with the support of Lincoln Center president William Schuman, it is ...
. It was re-released June 27, 2014, and shown at the
Brooklyn Academy of Music The Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) is a performing arts venue in Brooklyn, New York City, known as a center for progressive and avant-garde performance. It presented its first performance in 1861 and began operations in its present location in ...
and was re-released throughout the United States in the fall of 2014. Reviews were generally positive.


Background

Kirchheimer had come to the United States as a child in 1936 with his parents to escape
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
. He filmed ''Stations of the Elevated'' in 1977 and he had not known anyone who created graffiti before he started. Most people viewed graffiti artists as a nuisance at best and vandals at worst. Kirchheimer wanted to "elevate" their work as suggested in the title. He told ''
NPR National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...
'' that he would drive to
the Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...
and film the trains going overhead: Since the making of the film, New York City has completely eradicated graffiti appearing on subway cars, so the film documents an art form that no longer exists. ''Stations of the Elevated'' debuted in 1981 at the
New York Film Festival The New York Film Festival (NYFF) is a film festival held every fall in New York City, presented by Film at Lincoln Center (FLC). Founded in 1963 by Richard Roud and Amos Vogel with the support of Lincoln Center president William Schuman, it is ...
. The documentary was restored for a 2014 re-release and was shown at the Brooklyn Academy of Music with a live performance of the soundtrack from the Mingus Dynasty. When it was first released, it received no reviews and was essentially forgotten after its premier at the New York Film Festival.


Subject

This was the first film to document the graffiti movement in New York City, but it is not a documentary in the ordinary sense. There is no narrator and very little dialogue. Instead, subway cars covered with graffiti are followed as they move along the rails to a
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
soundtrack by
Charles Mingus Charles Mingus Jr. (April 22, 1922 – January 5, 1979) was an American jazz upright bassist, pianist, composer, bandleader, and author. A major proponent of collective improvisation, he is considered to be one of the greatest jazz musicians and ...
with
Aretha Franklin Aretha Louise Franklin ( ; March 25, 1942 – August 16, 2018) was an American singer, songwriter and pianist. Referred to as the " Queen of Soul", she has twice been placed ninth in ''Rolling Stone''s "100 Greatest Artists of All Time". With ...
. According to Leigh Silver, "... Kirchheimer captures the urban jungle in all of its untamed glory; shooting from behind branches and between scaffolding, Kirchheimer awaits the lumbering subway trains as they snake across tracks." At one point in the film, a group of boys are watching the trains whiz by and one boy says: "That one was all right. Wasn’t nothing special. The ''idea'' was good". According to Kevin Jagernauth writing for ''
Indiewire IndieWire (sometimes stylized as indieWIRE or Indiewire) is a film industry and review website that was established in 1996. The site's focus was predominantly independent film, although its coverage has grown to "to include all aspects of Hollyw ...
'', the graffiti artists featured are "Lee, The Fabulous 5, Shadow, Daze, Kase, Butch, Blade, Slave, 12 T2B, Ree, and Pusher". Kirchheimer, in his documentary film, also asks visually: How does this artwork that was deemed illegal coexist in a city with advertising that is deemed legal ndthat is possibly more offensive?" He does this by contrasting graffiti covered subway cars with billboards covered with images of products being advertised.


Critical reception

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
has three reviews all favorable but not enough to score the film. Note: Rotten Tomatoes misattributes the making of the film Charles Mingus instead of Manfred Kirchheimer. Daniel Walber said that viewing the film made him feel as though it was made by an extraterrestrial and it did so because "it presents the trains as the real New Yorkers". Writing for ''
Complex Complex commonly refers to: * Complexity, the behaviour of a system whose components interact in multiple ways so possible interactions are difficult to describe ** Complex system, a system composed of many components which may interact with each ...
'', Leigh Silver explains "... ''Stations of the Elevated'' has lasting power, a certain timelessness that speaks to the soul of New York."


References


External links

* {{IMDb title, id=0262792, title=Stations of the Elevated
Brooklyn Academy of Music
1981 films Graffiti in the United States Documentary films about New York City Documentary films about graffiti 1980s English-language films