Film Reviews

Build Something Modern

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• Details: Ireland/Nigeria/Kenya / 70mins (G).

I wanted to like this. The first thing I ever wanted to be was an architect, but when I moved from Junior Cert to Leaving Cert, Technical Drawing (as it was called then) dispelled with the straight lines I was so comfortable with in favour of parabolas and ellipses and such. I was at a loss and retreated to History - at least you could sit down in class. But the (crap) architect is still in me somewhere and a documentary about building churches in Africa piqued my interest.
Opening in a nursing home with elderly architects looking at slides from those glory days of Africa in the 60s, the group fall into reminiscing what it was like to take on that massive responsibility and their experiences in Africa. The heat, the insects, getting used to the slow nature of work, the ramshackle way in which they went about things: "we got X amount of concrete blocks… can you build a church?"
Build Something Modern takes the viewer through the trials and tribulations of building in an alien land. In the late 50s and 60s, Africa was emerging from its Dark Continent shadow but was still relatively unknown, especially to Irish architects. Drawing up plans for their projects, the architects soon learned that this was totally different to what they had done before, as the heat and the effect the sun would have on the concrete, along with the people and their culture, had to be factored in.
With shots of architects sitting in their houses, explaining drawings and messing around with protractors, directors Nicky Grogan and Paul Rowley realise that their documentary isn't the most visual in the world and endeavour to shake things up with split screens and animated interludes set to the sound of sparse electronica. The electronic soundtrack, awash African influences, mirrors what the architects were trying to achieve - take something from their world and somehow mesh it into this new one.
With archive footage of schools, churches, nuns and priests and with lots of shots of blueprints and drawings, it's hard to see this documentary reaching outside the likes of architects and the clergy. Grogan and Rowley exhibit enough evidence to show there's talent within and they will go on to produce a better quality of work, but they need to be more picky with their subject matter.

Review by Gavin Burke