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Producers: Brian Danitz and Tzelovanikov
Coproducer/Editor: Patricia Streeten
Executive Producer: Tzelovanikov
Screenwriter: Phil Cousineau
Music: David Darling
Art Direction: Rocky Pinciotti
Narrator: Linda Hunt
The changing nature of architecture and design is comprehensively
explored in this treatise on the emergence of ecological design
in the twentieth century. Beginning with pioneers like R. Buckminster
Fuller in the 1920's, the film examines the ideas and prototypes
of iconoclastic thinkers who have trail-blazed the development of
sustainable architecture in cities, energy systems, transports,
and industry.
Structured along the thematic lines, including topics like "Design
as a Way of Life," "Creating New Forms of Wealth."
"Designing with Nature," and "Regnerative Design,"
the film is remarkably informative and enlightening. Use of location
shots, animation, computer simulation, stills, blueprints, city
plans, time-lapse photography, and even footage from NASA weaves
a fascinating exploration of the aesthetics, challenges, and rewards
of the design process. Interviews with designers, ranging from inventors
like Fuller and Paul MacCready; architects Paolo Soleri, Peter Calthorpe
and James Wines; city planner Edmund Bacon; to design teacher Jay
Baldwin, anthropologist Mary Catherine Bateson, author Stewart Brand
and software designer Ted Nelson give us an inkling of dynamism
and cross-disciplianry scope involved in designing such artifacts
as solar structures. Arcologies, bioshelters, living machines, engineered
bioshelters, domed cities, electrical vehicles, and city transport.
Ecological Design: Inventing the Future offers an engrossing
tour of the future: the ideas, artifacts, and designers which will
shape the way we look and live in years to come. -Geoffrey Gilmore
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