Reflective Encounters

“With four credited directors, Urban Solutions builds its rebellious statement with supreme confidence and clarity. With a few exceptions, it takes the form of static shots that operate as a study of modern Brazil. These 16mm shots of foliage are textured and inviting, like the lush work of Nathanial Dorsky. 

These shots slowly move out of the natural world and into urban/industrial situations: specifically on security guards at both residential buildings and undisclosed businesses. At first this is narrated by a cheerful German voiceover, like a travel guide, setting out on a ‘Voyage Picturesque’ - an effort to merrily exoticise the Americas for a European audience. Soon it becomes clear this voice is from the colonial period, where artworks of the era begin to encroach on the present in humorous and unsettling ways. 

Then arrives the Brazilian perspective. The German narration is cut off by that bored security guard. Labour and contemplation are both linked and opposed, particularly by the intrusion of ever-more elaborate frames. The documentary feel of the film’s early stages is deconstructed and demolished by a playful but no less serious call for arms. This questions cinema itself: The grain of 16mm, and the flatly colourful images they produce, is not mere aesthetic texture but an attempt to drag together the past and present.”

— Ben Flanagan