RADFF18: Tadao Ando: Samurai Architect

The last film I saw was a demand performance due to popularity and was in the Grand theatre... and barely half full.

Tadao Ando is an architect, and he has designed many buildings. And during this movie, we take a look at many of them and he gives commentary on them. Two aspects of his stand out: he like to incorporate nature into his designs and he likes concrete. A lot of concrete. While not brutalist, it does feel like A LOT of concrete. While he has done many buildings in Japan, mainly Osaka, he's also done worldwise designs, and we see his latest effort in China. We also see some rejected designs.

Even at 75 minutes, this felt a bit longer than it needed to be. Which wasn't helped by a) my bladder filling up, and b) the guy near me wanting to continue some text chat throughout the movie (me being passive aggressive doesn't help there either).

This is probably the most on-target architecture film I saw, but it was probably also one of the driest, no matter how cheeky-chappy Ando came across as.

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