Soviet Bus Stops
May 24, 2024 | IMDB 9
56 min Watch NowDocumentary
“There’s a bus stop I want to photograph.” This may sound like a parody of an esoteric festival film, but Canadian Christopher Herwig’s photography project is entirely in earnest, and likely you will be won over by his passion for this unusual subject within the first five minutes. Soviet architecture of the 1960s and 70s was by and large utilitarian, regimented, and mass-produced. Yet the bus stops Herwig discovers on his journeys criss-crossing the vast former Soviet Bloc are something else entirely: whimsical, eccentric, flamboyantly artistic, audacious, colourful. They speak of individualism and locality, concepts anathema to the Communist doctrine. Herwig wants to know how this came to pass and tracks down some of the original unsung designers, but above all he wants to capture these exceptional roadside way stations on film before they disappear.
MOVIE COMMENTS
SIMILAR MOVIES
Un été à la Garoupe
The Builders of the Alhambra
Four Shorts on Architecture
Standard Operating Procedure
The Gateway Arch: A Reflection of America
Nel silenzio del parco
Camp Century: The Hidden City Beneath the Ice
Empire City
The Keepers of the Streak
Six Man
Little Potato
Big Time
The End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of the American Dream
David Hurn: A Life in Pictures
Man with a Movie Camera
Cathedrals
#monalisa
Ralph Erskine
The Paper Brigade
Decasia: The State of Decay
SIMILAR MOVIES
Un été à la Garoupe
IMDB 8 | Nov , 2020
La Garoupe, a beach in Antibes, in 1937. For one summer, the painter and photographer Man Ray films his friends Pablo Picasso, Dora Maar, Paul Eluard and his wife Nusch, as well as Lee Miller. During these few weeks, love, friendship, poetry, photography and painting are still mixed in the carefree and the creativity specific to the artistic movements of the interwar period.The Builders of the Alhambra
IMDB 7 | Nov , 2022
Kingdom of Granada, al-Andalus, 14th century. After recognizing that his land, always under siege, is hopelessly doomed to be conquered, Sultan Yusuf I undertakes the construction of a magnificent fortress with the purpose of turning it into the landmark of his civilization and his history, a glorious monument that will survive the oblivion of the coming centuries: the Alhambra.Four Shorts on Architecture
IMDB 0 | Oct , 1975
A visual essay on contemporary Kiwi architecture.Standard Operating Procedure
IMDB 6.8 | Feb , 2008
Errol Morris examines the incidents of abuse and torture of suspected terrorists at the hands of U.S. forces at the Abu Ghraib prison.The Gateway Arch: A Reflection of America
IMDB 0 | Aug , 2006
The Gateway Arch: A Reflection of America chronicles for the first time the complete story of this great American symbol… from Thomas Jefferson, Lewis & Clark, and St. Louis’ role in westward expansion; to the eventual construction of the largest stainless steel structure in history.Nel silenzio del parco
IMDB 0 | Sep , 2025
Camp Century: The Hidden City Beneath the Ice
IMDB 7 | Jan , 2020
How in 1959, during the heat of the Cold War, the government of the United States decided to create a secret military base located in the far north of Greenland: Camp Century, almost a real town with roads and houses, a nuclear plant to provide power and silos to house missiles aimed at the Soviet Union.Empire City
IMDB 9 | Jul , 1985
A film essay contrasting the modern metropolis with its "golden age" from 1830-1930, with the participation of some of New York's leading political and cultural figures. Made at a time when the city was experiencing unprecedented real estate development on the one hand and unforeseen displacement of population and deterioration on the other. Empire City is the story of two New Yorks. The film explores the precarious coexistence of the service-based midtown Manhattan corporate headquarters with the peripheral New York of undereducated minorities living in increasing alienation.The Keepers of the Streak
IMDB 0 | Jan , 2015
The NFL has staged 48 Super Bowls. Four photographers have taken pictures at every one of them. In KEEPERS OF THE STREAK, director Neil Leifer tells the story of this exclusive club, made up of John Biever, Walter Iooss, Mickey Palmer and Tony Tomsic. With their cameras, they have captured football's biggest game of the year for almost five decades.Six Man
IMDB 0 | Nov , 2025
During the 2012 season, two Montana High School teams compete in 6-man football, a smaller version of American football with increasing popularity in rural communities. It's pure football, for the sake of football, played by boys of all sizes and abilities, for themselves and for the communities who know them oh so well. No television timeouts. No place to sit. Six Man Football.Little Potato
IMDB 3 | Mar , 2017
Wes Hurley's autobiographical tale of growing up gay in Soviet Union Russia, only to escape with his mother, a mail order bride, to Seattle to face a whole new oppression in his new Christian fundamentalist American dad.Big Time
IMDB 5.5 | Oct , 2017
Big Time gets up close with Danish architectural prodigy Bjarke Ingels over a period of six years while he is struggling to complete his largest projects yet, the Manhattan skyscraper W57 and Two World Trade Center.The End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of the American Dream
IMDB 7.2 | Jan , 2004
Since World War II North Americans have invested much of their newfound wealth in suburbia. It has promised a sense of space, affordability, family life and upward mobility. As the population of suburban sprawl has exploded in the past 50 years Suburbia, and all it promises, has become the American Dream. But as we enter the 21st century, serious questions are beginning to emerge...David Hurn: A Life in Pictures
IMDB 0 | Nov , 2017
Documentary celebrating the life and career of world-renowned Magnum photographer David Hurn, possibly Wales's most important living photographer.Man with a Movie Camera
IMDB 7.8 | May , 1929
A cameraman wanders around with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling inventiveness.Cathedrals
IMDB 0 | Jul , 2014
The city of Ordos, in the middle of China, was build for a million people yet remains completely empty. Ordos is not so much a place but a symbol of babylonic hype. But nothing will change - as long as people believe.#monalisa
IMDB 0 | May , 2020
People looking at the Mona Lisa in the Louvre – or are they just looking at themselves?Ralph Erskine
IMDB 0 | Jul , 1986
The British architect based in Stockholm looks back on major projects of a long career inspired by European Modernism combined with his personal sensitivity to nature and community. Erskine is especially valued for his vital understanding of social interaction, exemplified in commissions for universities and housing complexes built from Scandinavia to Italy. The architect takes the camera on a tour of his buildings while offering revealing comments and interpretations.The Paper Brigade
IMDB 6 | Mar , 2018
Lithuania, 1941, during World War II. Hundreds of thousands of texts on Jewish culture, stolen by the Germans, are gathered in Vilnius to be classified, either to be stored or to be destroyed. A group of Jewish scholars and writers, commissioned by the invaders to carry out the sorting operations, but reluctant to collaborate and determined to save their legacy, hide many books in the ghetto where they are confined. This is the epic story of the Paper Brigade.Decasia: The State of Decay
IMDB 6.4 | Jan , 2002
A meditation on the human quest to transcend physicality, constructed from decaying archival footage and set to an original symphonic score.