Ackbar Abbas goes into detail about the “disappearance” of cities. From a cinematic perspective, film makers typically use architecture and the city as tools of story telling. For example, high density residential and industrial complex may be shown in western film to show a near dystopian future. This kind of visual representation may be shown without the film maker’s understanding of the complexity of the city. Most film makers choose to show a specific theme they wish to portray through architecture. This kind of interpretation without understanding can cause a global audience to form stigmas and misunderstandings of cities. From my understanding after the reading, the disappearance of cities seems like film makers using tunnel vision to focus in on a target, while blacking out everything else. To tell their version of the story and/or to invalidate others.
You have made an intriguing point on how city/ architecture is being borrowed to create a certain atmosphere of the film. It would be great if you could give examples to prove how there is a stigmatizing effect by film on cities. In fact, film can be a two-sided sword to narrate cities. It can deepen the audience’s understanding too. In the reading, Abbas was less certain about architecture than film. It would be nice if you could elaborate on how the tunnel visions of film have caused the disappearance of city/ architecture.
Lastly, I would like to remind you to leave your name at the end of your reading response for easy identification 🙂