Radiant City Film Review

by Kam Williams

Suburban Sprawl of McMansions Subject of Mockumentary

Anyone aspiring to move to suburbia might have second thoughts after watching Radiant City, a mockumentary which indicts these supposed idyllic oases as soulless dystopias bent on transforming the landscape into a zombie monoculture of malls and McMansions virtually indistinguishable from each other.

This provocative film, written and directed by Gary Burns and Jim Brown, paints a most unflattering picture of contemporary sprawl as an omnivorous blight of unchecked development which has ruined rather than improved our quality of life.

The movie revolves around the running commentary of the Moss family, recent arrivals who don't exactly revel in their new surroundings. Dad Evan (Bob Legare) drones on about his two-hour commute while wife Anne (Jane MacFarlane) whines about being reduced to a soccer mom who has to serves as her children's chauffeur, since they now must be driven everywhere they need to go.

However, the biggest toll is obviously being taken on their youngsters, Nick (Daniel Jeffery) and Jennifer (Ashleigh Fidyk). For they are being raised in an eerie, non-community where they are not only isolated from other kids, but must be content to exist in an antiseptic atmosphere devoid of birds and trees, or any natural scenery or local flavor.

Perhaps more telling than these familiar refrains are the complaints of the faux experts whose testimony is augmented by aerial God shots that clearly confirm the insane human rush to pave the planet. Irrefutable evidence that post modern suburbia is an unmitigated disaster which can't deliver on its seductive promise to deliver the good life to refugees from the big city.

Good (3 stars)
Unrated
Running time: 85 minutes
Studio: Odeon Films