Logo

Louis Sullivan: the Struggle for American Architecture

  • Documentary

April 4, 2010 (US)

1h 37m

The award-winning feature-length documentary about the revolutionary and brilliant Chicago architect Louis Sullivan (1856-1924). Known by historians as the 'father of the skyscraper' and creator of the iconic phrase 'form follows function,' Sullivan was on top of his profession i...

Top Casts

Offical videos from Youtube:

Similar Movies

Peter Eisenman: Building Germany's Holocaust Memorial

Peter Eisenman: Building Germany's Holocaust Memorial

Peter Eisenman: Building Germany's Holocaust Memorial (2009)


This documentary explores the creation of the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin as designed by architect Peter Eisenman. Reaction of the German public to the completed memorial is also shown.

Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work

Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work

Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work (2010)


A documentary on the life and career of Joan Rivers, made as the comedienne turns 75 years old.

Antoni Gaudi: God's Architect

Antoni Gaudi: God's Architect

Antoni Gaudi: God's Architect (2003)


Documentary about Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi made for the BBC series "Visions of Space".

Unity Temple: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Modern Masterpiece

Unity Temple: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Modern Masterpiece

Unity Temple: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Modern Masterpiece (2022)


Frank Lloyd Wright’s Modern Masterpiece, Unity Temple is an homage to America’s most renowned architect. The film pulls back the curtain on Wright’s first public commission in the early 1900’s to the painstaking efforts to restore the 100 year old building back to its original beauty. The dedicated team of historians, craftspeople, members of the Unitarian congregation and Unity Temple Restoration Foundation reveal the history of one of Wright’s most innovative buildings that merged his love of architecture with his own spiritual values. The film intersperses the architect’s philosophies with quotes narrated by Brad Pitt.

Architects Herzog and deMeuron: The Alchemy of Building & The Tate Modern

Architects Herzog and deMeuron: The Alchemy of Building & The Tate Modern

Architects Herzog and deMeuron: The Alchemy of Building & The Tate Modern (2001)


Visiting examples of Herzog and de Meurons ground-breaking style, this film reflects their capacity to astonish and explore the way in which they transform what might otherwise be ordinary through new treatments and techniques.

Joan Baez: How Sweet the Sound

Joan Baez: How Sweet the Sound

Joan Baez: How Sweet the Sound (2009)


Following folk musician Joan Baez on her extensive 2008-2009 tour, this film commemorates her career, which has spanned five decades. It includes concert and archival footage as well as interviews with such disparate colleagues, friends and admirers as Bob Dylan, Jesse Jackson and David Crosby. In addition to the music, it also touchs upon Baez's long history of global social activism.

Richard Meier

Richard Meier

Richard Meier (1986)


Meier guides the viewer on a retrospective of his white buildings, from private houses of the 1960s to the Frankfurt and Atlanta Museums of the 1980s--all variations on his trademark spatial and planar treatment. His influences from Corbusier, Wright, Mies, and Baroque Germany are shown. Clients and colleagues offer opinions.

One Big Home

One Big Home

One Big Home (2017)


On the tiny island of Martha's Vineyard, where presidents and celebrities vacation, trophy homes threaten to destroy the islands unique character. Twelve years in the making, One Big Home follows one carpenters journey to understand the trend toward giant houses. When he feels complicit in wrecking the place he calls home, he takes off his tool belt and picks up a camera.

Slums: Cities of Tomorrow

Slums: Cities of Tomorrow

Slums: Cities of Tomorrow (2014)


One billion people on our planet—one in six—live in shantytowns, slums or squats. Slums: Cities of Tomorrow challenges conventional thinking to propose that slums are in fact the solution, not the problem, to urban overcrowding caused by the massive migration of people to cities. (Lynne Fernie, HotDocs)

Louis Kahn's Tiger City

Louis Kahn's Tiger City

Louis Kahn's Tiger City (2019)


Art historian and filmmaker Sundaram Tagore travels in the footsteps of Louis Kahn to discover how the famed American architect built a daringly modern and monumental parliamentary complex in war-torn Bangladesh.

Fading City

Fading City

Fading City (2020)


A docu-art film about Kyiv and the contemporary problems of the capital. The film raises the issue of the dilapidated state of Kyiv's old buildings and the search for effective mechanisms to preserve the city's architectural heritage.

Capturing the Friedmans

Capturing the Friedmans

Capturing the Friedmans (2003)


An Oscar nominated documentary about a middle-class American family who is torn apart when the father Arnold and son Jesse are accused of sexually abusing numerous children. Director Jarecki interviews people from different sides of this tragic story and raises the question of whether they were rightfully tried when they claim they were innocent and there was never any evidence against them.

Bauhaus 100

Bauhaus 100

Bauhaus 100 (2019)


In 1919 an art school opened in Germany that would change the world forever. It was called the Bauhaus. A century later, its radical thinking still shapes our lives today. Bauhaus 100 is the story of Walter Gropius, architect and founder of the Bauhaus, and the teachers and students he gathered to form this influential school. Traumatised by his experiences during the Great War, and determined that technology should never again be used for destruction, Gropius decided to reinvent the way art and design were taught. At the Bauhaus, all the disciplines would come together to create the buildings of the future, and define a new way of living in the modern world.

Paris, the Mystery of the Disappeared Palace

Paris, the Mystery of the Disappeared Palace

Paris, the Mystery of the Disappeared Palace (2023)


In the heart of Paris, an entire palace has disappeared. It was the very first residence of the kings of France. Long before Versailles, long before the Louvre, the Palais de la Cité stood on the most prestigious island in Paris, the historic cradle of France, facing Notre-Dame. So majestic in the Middle Ages, this palace has become a ghost of history. Over the centuries, this architectural masterpiece has almost completely disappeared. A trio of experts will resurrect it in 3D. Using science and unprecedented excavations, they will track down the pieces of the puzzle to reconstruct it at its peak in the 14th century, and bring back to life those who inhabited it. From the Romans to the Vikings, from Saint Louis to the cursed kings, all have left clues of this 'Versailles of the Middle Ages'.

Big Time

Big Time

Big Time (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.

Eiffel's Race to the Top

Eiffel's Race to the Top

Eiffel's Race to the Top (2023)


Behind the iconic Eiffel Tower lies the story of an incredible challenge to erect a thousand-foot tower that went far beyond a design competition, and marked a major turning point in engineering history. It was the beginning of radical transformation where iron was pitted against stone, engineering against architecture, and modern design against ancients. Press campaigns, lobbying, public conferences, denigration of opposing projects, bragging about big names - all participants engaged in a fierce battle without concession. Using 3D recreations, official sources (reports, letters, drawings...) and intimate archives obtained from their descendants, this film will bring to life this vertical race through a fresh and visual way to mark the centenary of Eiffel death.

The Hermits

The Hermits

The Hermits (2019)


In the midst of the chaos of México City, a group of eight bachelor millennials who call themselves ´The Hermits´, open the doors to their tiny apartments in the historic Ermita Building, in the yet-to-be gentrified neighborhood of Tacubaya, and share their life experiences in a time when precarity changes the way in which we love, feel and relate to each other. As we explore the homes of these eight neighbors, we also witness their personalities intersect in a Whatsapp chat, a virtual space that functions as a supporting system that helps them face the adversities that living alone in this city brings.

Bird's Nest - Herzog & de Meuron in China

Bird's Nest - Herzog & de Meuron in China

Bird's Nest - Herzog & de Meuron in China (2008)


Schaub and Schindelm’s documentary follows two Swiss star architects, Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, on two very different projects: the national stadium for the Olympic summer games in Peking 2008 and a city area in the provincial town of Jinhua, China.

Going Attractions: The Definitive Story of the Movie Palace

Going Attractions: The Definitive Story of the Movie Palace

Going Attractions: The Definitive Story of the Movie Palace (2019)


Celebrating the splendor and grandeur of the great cinemas of the United States, built when movies were the acme of entertainment and the stories were larger than life, as were the venues designed to show them. The film also tracks the eventual decline of the palaces, through to today’s current preservation efforts. A tribute to America’s great art form and the great monuments created for audiences to enjoy them in.

Jugaad

Jugaad

Jugaad (2020)


Jugaad is a Hindi word that can be translated as "innovative or effective solution that bends the rules". It refers to the extreme capacity developed by Mumbai's inhabitants to adapt and get around any type of constraint or obstacle posed by the city's urban structure. In a relatively small piece of land where 21 million people live today, the inhabitants of Mumbai demonstrate great creativity when it comes to managing the spaces (for sale, for prayer, for traffic) and the flows that cross them every day. Without using language, Hong Kong artist Chak Hin Leung brings together in this video a dozen unique situations in which people, animals, vehicles and natural elements intermingle and brush up against each other, without ever colliding.