"Steam pouring from manhole covers, the neon-lights of 42nd street seen through rain-streaked taxicab windows, phalanxes of cops spied from tenement rooftops as they sweep a city block - David C. Roberts's Song of My City distills the visual rushes of a score of 1970s and early '80s New York City-set film classics into a 15-minute city symphony of sorts. Drawing inspiration from 1920s pictures such as Walter Ruttman's Berlin: Symphony of a Metropolis,"
"I didn't come to New York until I was probably 20, 21, but I started watching these movies - Taxi Driver, Dog Day Afternoon... - in seventh grade or eighth grade. That cinematic setting was so foreign to me but so exciting. I felt like I knew the streets, and how they worked. The purpose of Song of My City was to recreate that vibe I had as a child. What was my New York before I went to New York?"
Song of My City assembles footage from 1970s and early 1980s New York-set films into a 15-minute city symphony that condenses cinematic impressions of the metropolis. The piece draws on Taxi Driver, Dog Day Afternoon, Across 110th Street and The Warriors and takes inspiration from 1920s city symphonies like Walter Ruttman's Berlin: Symphony of a Metropolis. The work aims to evoke the sense memories of viewers whose images of New York derive from film. Collage filmmaking techniques are used to navigate the mythic versus real city and to locate a personal sense of place through editorial juxtaposition.
Read at Filmmaker Magazine
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