There are a lot of great things here. The narration feels so fresh and peculiar that you can't find anything like it in modern documentaries. It feels nice to listen to. Calm and focused with a poetic flair. The editing is top notch as it jumps from interviews to shots of the building process. This is great work! I could watch a 30 hour long documentary made this way.
The conflicts are illustrated in short interviews and then points about the people are made while photos are shown on screen. It's not clear who said what or why, but the gists of things are clearly illustrated. Utzon was a genius who just wanted perfection. To create a wonder of the world. Australia didn't know what it wanted as politicians who didn't know anything about building ran the show and micromanaged things. As it often happens the genius was cut down so that the arrogant fools could take over.
There are small stories like engineers in Australia got mad at Utzon for solving a problem they spent years trying to solve.
At the end of the day it seems clear that the politicians in Australia are amazing at one thing, wasting money. While Jørn Utzon clearly was a genius who the politicians wanted to make a yes-man out of which made both sides irritated.
It's a rushjob because the politicians wanted it done their way and in their tempo. Giving Utzon decent preparation time would have solved much of the cost issue. But at the end of the day it didn't matter because they could rush him, go over cost, then point the finger at him and keep power.
Later Utzon swore to never visit Australia again as his project got stolen from him. And Australia didn't mention him in relation to the finished project. Finally he was "forgiven" by Australia in 2004 when he was asked to finish a room in the Opera House. But the documentary never even shows the finished Opera House. It ends in a thud - fitting. I really hope we see a new documentary about this because there is much more to tell here.
The conflicts are illustrated in short interviews and then points about the people are made while photos are shown on screen. It's not clear who said what or why, but the gists of things are clearly illustrated. Utzon was a genius who just wanted perfection. To create a wonder of the world. Australia didn't know what it wanted as politicians who didn't know anything about building ran the show and micromanaged things. As it often happens the genius was cut down so that the arrogant fools could take over.
There are small stories like engineers in Australia got mad at Utzon for solving a problem they spent years trying to solve.
At the end of the day it seems clear that the politicians in Australia are amazing at one thing, wasting money. While Jørn Utzon clearly was a genius who the politicians wanted to make a yes-man out of which made both sides irritated.
It's a rushjob because the politicians wanted it done their way and in their tempo. Giving Utzon decent preparation time would have solved much of the cost issue. But at the end of the day it didn't matter because they could rush him, go over cost, then point the finger at him and keep power.
Later Utzon swore to never visit Australia again as his project got stolen from him. And Australia didn't mention him in relation to the finished project. Finally he was "forgiven" by Australia in 2004 when he was asked to finish a room in the Opera House. But the documentary never even shows the finished Opera House. It ends in a thud - fitting. I really hope we see a new documentary about this because there is much more to tell here.
