Hot Docs 2012 - Detropia (Ewing & Grady, 2012) ****

Acclaimed documentarians Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady (Jesus Camp) offer in Detropia a visually stunning, thought-provoking mosaic of a decaying urban city that evocatively shows the macro and microeconomic causes of the fastest shrinking city in America. A provocative feature that seeks to portray the city of Detriot's woes as a microcosm for what's currently ailing the U.S, Ewing and Grady employ a detached, fragmented narrative that peeks in on the myriad abandoned homes and buildings in the downtown core and lets its subjects speak for themselves.

Detroit, a city that used to employ hundreds of thousands of people who could pull in a decent wage working at an automotive plant, has been steadily in decline since the 1980s, when the corporate push for cheap, foreign workers and federal divestment from municipal coffers became economic effects of the Reagan administration. As a result, the city has been mired with issues of poverty, crime and general degredation for decades, with no hope in sight for long time union workers looking to retire before they reach old age, or youth abanoned by the education system looking for steady work, or even a way to keep afloat. Presently, all the wealth in the Detriot area is centralized in the suburbs, beyond the city's infamous 8 Mile, as director Ewing even alluded to in her remarks after the film.

This kind of background is important for understanding the film's aesthetic, which means that the film will probably mostly appeal to those who have an interest in municipal policy, economics or urban planning, but for my money, does not lessen its power or its message. Ewing and Grady decline to establish a main subject, but there are a few interesting Detrioters that cross the viewers path: There's the deeply philosophical, politically astitute "last black owner" of a blues bar just outside the city; the charismatic, slightly senile union leader who longs for the good old days; and the blogger / barista with a big personality who has an interesting hobby of sneaking into abandoned buildings, taking pictures and sharing the property's stories with the world. The rest of the film is comprised of beautifully shot vignettes that give sometimes bleak, sometimes quirky and sometimes life-affirming snapshots of modern day Detroit.

This is a documentary that is not about "solutions" or establishing a public relations campaign to save Detroit. Rather, Detropia is a kaleidoscopic journey into a city that reminds us of the kindness and perseverence of the American people despite economic woe. Those who are engaged in, or passionately observing economics at the municipal level will immediately find much food-for-thought in the filmmakers' subtle depiction of the City as perhaps the most important level of government when it comes to maintaining the well being of the American citizens but fans of gorgeous, intelligent documentaries would be remiss to pass up Detropia.