Utopian spaces from comic movies

ANALYSIS OF UTOPIAN SPACES FROM COMIC MOVIES A DISSERTATION REPORT

Submitted by

KEERTHANA. S.D

In partial fulfilment for the award of the degree Of

BACHELOR OF ARCHITECTURE

IN ARCHITECTURE

THIAGARAJAR COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING, MADURAI-625015 (A Govt. aided, ISO 9001:2000 Certified Autonomous Institution)

ANNA UNIVERSITY: CHENNAI 600 028 OCTOBER 2014

THIAGARAJAR COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING (A Govt. Aided, Autonomous Institution Affiliated to Anna University) MADURAI-625015

ANNA UNIVERSITY: CHENNAI 600 025

BONAFIDE CERTIFICATE

Certified that this dissertation report “ANALYSIS OF UTOPIAN SPACES FROM COMIC MOVIES” is the bonafide work of “KEERTHANA .S.D” who carried out the dissertation work under my supervision.

INTERNAL EXAMINER

EXTERNAL EXAMINER

SUPERVISOR

HEAD OF DEPARTMENT

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT First and foremost, I thank the “Lord Almighty� for giving me courage and wisdom to take up this project and complete it successfully.

I take immense pleasure in thanking the dissertation co-ordinator, Ar.Dr.S. Radhakrishnan, Professor, Department of architecture, Thiagarajar College of Engineering, Madurai and Ar.Jaisimmah for their guidance and support.

I take this opportunity to thank Head of the Department, Ar. Dr. Jinu Louishidha for giving me an opportunity to undertake this dissertation.

I would like to extend my deepest gratitude to my guide, Asst. Professor, Ar.M.Sindhuja, for her excellent guidance, care and patience, providing me with all the support I needed to complete my dissertation.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Ar.Lakshmi Thilagam and Ar.P.Anantha Lakshmi for guiding me on how to proceed with this topic.

I would also like to thank my seniors, Madhulika, Raj Kumar, Indrajith and Vijay whose constant support and encouragement always gave me a positive outlook and helped me through out.

Finally I would like to thank all my friends Hizwer, Silamboli, Divya, Karthik, Ananya,Indu, Cholan and juniors who were kind enough to spend their valuable time in helping me and motivating me through all my stages.

KEERTHANA. S.D

CONTENTS

CHAPTER NO.

PARTICULARS

PAGE NO.

LIST OF FIGURES ABSTRACT 1

2

3

4

Introduction to the title

1

1.1 Utopian

1

1.2 Comic movies

1

1.3 Utopian Architecture

1

History and Evolution of Utopian Architecture

1

2.1 No place

2

2.2 Influence of Industrial Revolution

2

2.3. Phalanstère

2

Architect‟s Visions

3

3.1 The Futurists and the Machine

3

3.2 Le Corbusier

3

3.3 Broadacre city

4

3.4 Paolo Soleri –Arcology

4

Through the Years

5

4.1 Archigram

5

4.2 Centercity

6

5

Buildings Inspired from Failed Utopian Concepts of Architects

7

5.1 Octagon City, the Vegetarian Utopia

7

5.2. Le Corbusier and Utopia

7

5.2.1. Unite d'habitation

8

5.3. Where Everything Is Locally Made

8

5.4. Arcosanti

9

6

Inference on Utopian Development

9

7.

Architecture in Cinema

10

7.1 Film: The Third Dimension in Motion

10

7.2 Overlap Analysis

10

7.3. Understanding Spaces in Cinema

11

Literature Study- Influences of Architectural Styles

13

8

8.1 Gotham City – Batman Series

13

8.1.1 City Planning

13

8.1.2 Layout of the City

14

8.1.3 Skyline Analysis – Physical Structure

14

8.1.4. Emphasis

15

8.1.5 Central Focus

16

8.1.6 Movement

16

8.1.7 Architectural Style – Gothic Architecture

17

8.1.8. Architectural Style – Art Deco

18

8.1.9. Inference

18

9

8.2 Asgard City – Thor Series

20

8.2.1. The Norse Myth

20

8.2.2. Architectural Aspects

21

8.2.3. Asgard City Planning

21

8.2.4. Skyline Analysis

22

8.2.5. Architectural Styles

23

8.2.6. Inference

25

Literature Study of Futuristic Cities from Comic Movies 9.1 Xandar City

27 27

9.1.1. Influence and Development of Xandar

27

9.1.2. Santiago Calatrava

28

9.1.3. Characteristic Architectural Style Followed By Santiago Calatrava

28

9.1.4. Gardens by the Bay, Singapore

30

9.1.5. Santiago Calatrava Influence on Xandar City

31

10

Present Scenario of Futuristic Structures

32

11

Approved Proposals of Futuristic Structures

37

12

Future Earth from Star Trek Series

40

13.

12.1. Mega Structures

40

12.2. Physical Structure

40

12.3. Conceptual Depiction

40

12.4. Transportation

41

12.5. Architecture of the Future

41

12.6. Inference

42

Conclusion

44

13.1. Architecture for Cinema - Cinema for Architecture

44

13.2. Do We Really Need Utopias?

46

13.3. Influence of Utopian Visions from Cinema

46

13.4. Argument on Possibility of Such Visions

47

13.5 Scope of Architects in the Field

47

References

48

Bibliography

50

LIST OF FIGURES

FIGURE NO.

TITLE

PAGE NO.

2.1

Utopia

2

2.2

Phalanstère

2

3.1

Computer visualization of Sant„Elia sketches

3

3.2

La Ville Radieuse

4

3.3

Hexahedron Arcology

5

4.1

New Babylon

5

4.2

No-Stop City(1969)

5

4.3

Archigram

6

4.4

Centricity – Lebbeus Woods

6

5.1

Utopian Concepts of Architects

7

5.2

Vertical Garden City

7

5.3

Unite d'habitation

8

5.4

Broadacre City

8

5.5

Arcosanti

9

6.1

Inference

9

7.1

Film: The Third Dimension in Motion

10

7.2

Overlap Analysis:

10

8.1

Gotham City

13

8.2

Skyline Analysis

14

8.3

Skyline 1

15

8.4

Skyline 2

15

8.5

Skyline 3

15

8.6

Central focus

16

8.7

Transportation network

16

8.8

Monorail

16

8.9

Gothic Influence

17

8.10

Anton Furst Sketch from Batman movie(1989)

17

8.11

Concept art – Pointed arch detail

18

8.12

Gargoyles

18

8.13

Architectural Style – Art Deco, Anton Furst skectch

18

8.14

Headquarters for Pricewaterhousecoopers

19

8.15

Asgard City

20

8.16

Norse Myth

20

8.17

Asgard City Plan

21

8.18

Bifrost

21

8.19

Valhalla

22

8.20

Hall of Asgards

22

8.21

Palace Of Frigga and Gladsheim

22

8.22

Skyline

22

8.25

Romanesque Style

23

8.26

Ribbed Vaults- Movie extracts

23

8.27

Butteress – Movie extracts

24

8.28

Drum Colums/ Arcade- Movie extracts

24

8.29

Scandinavian Architecture

24

8.30

Ariel view

25

9.1

Xandar city

27

9.2

Ariel view Xandar city

28

9.3

Santiago Calatrava

28

9.4

Concepts of Calatrava

29

9.5

Garden by the Bay, Singapore

30

9.6

Santiago Calatrava‟s influence on Xandar City

31

10.1

Art and Science Pavilion, 8th China flower expo

32

10.2

Water Discus Hotel

33

10.3

Foster + Partner‟s new Apple Campus in Cupertino

33

10.4

Kingdom Tower, Jeddah

34

10.5

Kingdom Tower, Jeddah

35

10.6

Samsung HQ

35

10.7

Amanora Apartment City - Future Towers

36

10.8

Amanora Apartment City construction status

36

11.1

Tianjin Eco city

37

11.2

West 57th Apartment Building, Manhattan

38

11.3

CPH Arch

39

12.1

Star Trek –Future Earth

40

12.2

Physical Structure

40

12.3

Transportation

41

12.4

Architecture of Future

41

12.5

Inference Future Earth

42

13.1

Image: A sketch by Mark Goerner

44

13.2

Image: A sketch by Mark Goerner

44

13.3

Illustration of Movies

45

13.4

Jean Nouvel‟s Work

45

13.5

Jean Nouvel‟s Work

46

13.6

Rendered Digital Movie Set

46

13.7

Zaha Hadid‟s Galaxy Soho Building

47

13.8

Foster + Partners Virgin Galactic‟s civilian space

47

13.9

Marvel Editor Sana Amanat

47

ABSTRACT

“Architecture should embody the invisible, the hope and the dreams in something we live in, we die in and we remember.�

(Daniel Libeskind)

Utopian visions in architecture have always played a vital role in the visualization of the future. The utopian vision of many great Architects have changed the way people saw the world. Some utopian vision made a significant mark and it still lasts on the earth. Some have failed but then they are still an abundant source of knowledge for any Architect.

Our world is subjected to a lot of rapid changes resulting in advanced technologies. These advanced technologies always have an upward growth among the people. Then again, architecture grows with the technology. They are in a way interconnected. The technology may it be present up gradation or the futuristic ideas are portrayed in the movies. Thereby, cinema again is updating people on which these changes that are happening and that might happen in the future. In other words, they depict the upcoming future through the wonderful visual medium.

The architecture is an ever changing phenomenon. Cinema induces the utopian illusions of architecture and varied technology. Cinema throws light on the utopic and dystopic realms through which any common man can perceive and understand the future. As architects these utopian visions give a break through, a inspiration of modern visual culture. These visual phenomena act as a strong source of visual tropes employed by architects in the present scenario.

Film architecture and design has existed almost as long as cinema itself. It is indisputable that the two are interconnected and that a process exists where both feed off from one another.

Cinema learns from architecture and architecture learns from cinema. As far back as 1926, many architects were said to have been impressed and influenced by Metropolis (1926).

Today, terms like science fiction architecture, high-tech architecture or cyber architecture are commonly used to refer to a new and modern style of architecture that draws heavily on science fiction and new technologies. For many architects, science fiction is an imaginative form of design, making its visualizations worth studying.

This study aims at understanding the essence of utopian culture left by the architects and understanding the science-fiction cinemaâ€&#x;s particular genre comic category in depth. This study aims to connect various sections like utopian architectural visions, architecture and its everlasting relationship with cinema, utopian futuristic vision broadcasted in these comic movies and their larger impact on present architecture and future of architecture.

These varied interlinked categories opens out to influences on architect and the upcoming future architectural growth at the same time helping architectural students to look upon the depths of cinematic architecture and impact of it in the profession of architecture.The utopian concepts resemble or sometimes are identical to designs seen and observed from existing structures.

Thereby, understanding that architecture and cinema are interdependent and interconnected where both learn from each other. Architects, among others get influenced by things that happen in art. In the end, the study should draw out the inspiration and concepts to guide the architects in the development of futuristic designs. Also, synthesizing and differentiating the possible utopian structures.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 1

1. INTRODUCTION TO THE TITLE: 1.1. Utopian: The term ―utopian‖ means modeled on or aiming for a state in which everything is perfect; idealistic. This style, used in the design of the progressive, idealistic and yet unworldly and quixotic worlds in comic book cities and structures, embodies the hopes, dreams, and visions that the human mind can conjure for the future. Utopia is a community or society possessing highly desirable or near perfect qualities. The word was coined by Sir Thomas More in Latin for his 1516 book Utopia, describing a fictional island society in the Atlantic Ocean. The term has been used to describe both intentional communities that attempt to create an ideal society, and imagined societies portrayed in fiction. It has spawned other concepts, most prominently dystopia.

1.2 Comic Movies: The term comic movies here identify: 

Films that are adaptations of English-language comics, and those films whose characters originated in comic books (e.g. Batman is not an adaptation of one particular comic book, but the character first appeared in comic books, not in another medium)



Films based on English-language comics, including comic books, graphic novels, and features in anthology comics magazines



It does not include material where the original source is newspaper comic strips.

1.3 Utopian Architecture: Visionary architecture is the name given to architecture which exists only on paper or which has visionary qualities. While the term 'visionary' suggests the idea of an idealistic, impractical or Utopian notion, it also depicts a mental picture produced by the imagination. .

2. HISTORY AND EVOLUTION OF UTOPIAN ARCHITECTURE The ideal city as a reflection of human aspirations for idealized life can be found in every major culture across the world. Fact says that this aspiration long began in China before Greece. The Zhou Dynasty (1046–256BCE) developed a vision of organizing the country according to the sacred geometrical principle of the Magic Square. According to the Chinese, an ideal society could take shape through an ideal division of space: from the private home to the entire universe. A couple of centuries later in The Republic, Plato described a perfect society aimed at constantly educating its citizens in the ideal city of Kallipolis.

The Greek model was adopted by the Romans, who established their cities upon a uniform grid, characterized by the Cardo and Decumanus. This was a universal system for spatial orientation, which had it roots in the desire to control the whole world.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 2

2.1. No Place: The word was coined by Sir Thomas More in Latin for his 1516 book Utopia, describing a fictional island society in the Atlantic Ocean.

The term has been used to describe both intentional communities that attempt to create an ideal society, and imagined societies portrayed in fiction. Thomas More, for example, was strongly inspired by ancient stories and was the first to use the term "utopia" in his book Utopia (1516). The title meant "no place‖, while the book depicted a fictional island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean where there was no private ownership, with goods being stored in warehouses and people requesting what they needed. There were also no locks on the doors of the houses, which were rotated between the citizens every ten years.

“If you know one of their cities, you know them all, for they are exactly alike, except where geography itself makes a difference. So I'll describe one of them, and no matter which.”

-Thomas More, Utopia

2.2. Influence of the Industrial Revolution: In order to fulfill their dreams, people suddenly had not only political will at their disposal, but also the power of the machine. Industry did not provide only opportunities, however. It also brought about the rise of the great industrial cities, crowded with poorly paid and unhealthy workers who lived in terrible conditions. The avant-garde socialist Charles Fourier spoke out for these people, developing the concept of the Phalanstère (1808): detailed plans for a remote community of around 1,600 people working in cooperation for a mutual purpose.

Lack of financing prevented him from seeing his grand-hôtel in the real world, but later in the same century Godin in France and Ruskin in the US set up working colonies that took their inspiration from Fourier‘s work.

2.3. Phalanstère (1808): A phalanstère (or Phalanstery) was a type of building designed for a utopian community and developed in the early 19th century by Charles Fourier. Fourier named these selfcontained communities, ideally consisting of 500-2000 people working together for mutual benefit, after the phalanx, the basic military unit in Ancient Greece. Though Fourier published several journals in Paris, among them La Phalanstère, he created no phalanstères in Europe due to a lack of financial support.

The structure of the phalanstère was composed by three parts: a central part and two lateral wings. The central part was designed for quiet activities. It included dining rooms, meeting rooms,

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 3

libraries and studies. A lateral wing was designed for labor and noisy activities, such as carpentry, hammering and forging. It also hosted children because they were considered noisy while playing.

The other wing contained a caravansary, with ballrooms and halls for meetings with outsiders. The outsiders had to pay a fee in order to visit and meet the people of the Phalanx community. This income was thought to sustain the autonomous economy of the phalanstère.

The phalanstère also included private apartments and many social halls. A social hall was defined by Fourier as a seristère.

3. ARCHITECTS VISIONS: The concept of a utopia has been very influential in the arts, especially for architects. At the beginning of the 20th century, the world was facing the devastation and destruction wrought

by World War I. In architecture, the modernist movement was beginning to take shape, and architects believed that their buildings could help solve the world's problems. With new materials like glass, iron, and steel made available by the Industrial Revolution, modernist architects took to their drafting tables to imagine entirely new cities that supported utopian ideals and were devoid of the corrupted bourgeois sentiments often blamed for many of society's dilemmas. Some utopian visions focused on new technology, others on open, untouched landscapes, and still others were based on new social orders, but all were united under radically avant-garde and cutting-edge architecture. . While these visions suffered from a megalomaniacal belief that one person's ideas could change an entire society, each architects' plans are admirable in their experimental efforts.

3.1. The Futurists and the Machine: Italian architect Antonio Sant‘Elia‘s "La Città Nuova" was one of the designs most symbolic of the Futurist ideology. Unlike classic spread-out metropolises, the city of the future consisted of a centralized massive, vertical conurbation that included skyscrapers interconnected by bridges, aerial walkways, exterior elevator shafts, and funiculars. The mechanized city was designed around a lifestyle that always looked to the future, and held a foundation in renewal—constantly demolishing outdated structures to make way for newer technologies. This characteristic transience kept Sant'Elia's ever changing visions on the drafting table. The dwelling machine, rooted in the utopian, anti-historic futurism of Marinetti and Sant‘Elia, was part of a new world of standardization and prefabrication.

It described living in terms of family size, economic expenditure, functionality, circulations, sunlit environments and health issues.

Computer visualization of Sant„Elia sketches

3.2. Le Corbusier: Through the 1920s and 1930s, modern ―master‖ Le Corbusier experimented with a series of highly utopian urban planning concepts, stemming from his visions of an ideal city that hoped to reunite citizens with a highly ordered and open environment, elevating culture on a universal basis. In 1925, he proposed the "Plan Voisin," an idealistic mega-project that called

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 4

for the bulldozing of central Paris and replacing it with monolithic 60-story towers set within an organized street grid and ample green space.

Corbusier believed the efficient plan could transform society by raising the standard of living for all socioeconomic levels, thus sparing the country another revolution. However, the "Plan Voisin" actually divided housing based on class, illustrating flaws in his utopian aspirations.

The plan was outright rejected, and the frustrated architect ventured outside Europe to spread his ideas.

Following his manifesto Vers une Architecture (1923), later revised in La Ville Radieuse (1935), Le Corbusier took praise of technological advancement and renewal to a utopian degree in his project Plan Voisin (1925), proposing the demolition of a large part of old Paris to erect sixty-story cruciform towers.

He considered his partially implemented vision in Unité d Habitation in Marseille, France, and in the master plan for Chandigargh (India), as proof of the success of Modernism. Le Corbusier‘s utopian ideals were entrenched in colonial thinking—the civilized European designing to better the non-West—and typically benefited upper classes. Most of Corbusier's urban plans never materialized, except for his later master plan for Chandigarh, India, the success of which is still debated today.

3.3. Broadacre City: Earlier modernist utopian visions centered on densely packed cities, Frank Lloyd Wright rejected urban areas altogether. Believing that city life was plagued by corrupted values, he fled to the suburbs, where he envisioned a new, modernized lifestyle set within bucolic landscapes. In 1932, Wright drafted a vision for his "Broadacre City," named because each family received a one-acre plot of land.

The complete antithesis of Le Corbusier‘s ideal cities, Broadacre championed low-density development centered on automobile transit, where all amenities could be easily accessed within a radius of 150 miles. Wright detailed plans for spacious landscaped highways, beautifully designed public service stations, roadside markets, garden schools, and parks, which were integrated to foster self-improvement and maximize enjoyment. Apartment buildings and train stations were kept to a minimum, as Wright believed that pedestrians could only safely exist on open land, and embraced the benefits of the countryside.

3.4. Paolo Soleri –Arcology: Modernist utopian plans sought to reconnect city life with nature by building towering buildings in the middle of ample green space, visionary architect Paolo Soleri, envisioned a more seamless integration of the two.

Soleri conceived "arcology,‖ a term that literally fuses architecture with ecology. Designing under this new principle, Soleri drafted numerous utopian buildings that brought nature into every aspect of urban life to help cities densify while lessening human impact on the environment. Arcology was Soleri's antidote to the inherently wasteful, inefficient, and

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 5

resource-consuming effects of urban sprawl, a reality that the architect believed manifests an unhappy lifestyle of physical isolation in today's American cities and suburbs.

The most recognizable of Soleri‘s concepts was his Hexahedron Arcology, a highly dense, 3,000 ft structure in the shape of two offset inverted pyramids that incorporated passive solar technologies to generate energy and reduce dependency on resources. Accommodating 170,000 residents, this man-made mountain compact with sprawling urban life into a tight-knit system where living, working, and public spaces are placed in close proximity of one another, making it easy and efficient to move about the complex. Soleri proposed eliminating private transportation— especially the automobile—to foster socialization and connection among residents.

Walking was the primary form of transportation, which was aided by a network of pedestrian walkways, elevators, and lifts. The structure would also be built adjacent to uninhabited wilderness—not just landscaped parks—making all social classes dwellers of both the city and country, and providing them with low-impact access to nature. A revolution in urban planning, Soleri‘s utopia was rooted in the principle of reducing social alienation by creating diverse yet intrinsically connected communities centered on ecology.

4. THROUGH THE YEARS Architects soon grew bored with hygiene and technology, however. Constant Nieuwenhuys‟ New Babylon (1966) is all about playful man, making full use of his creativity in a totally automated world that does not rely on human labor. People move and inhabit as they see fit a super construction spread around the whole world. Using a similar approach, Archizoom, Superstudio and Peter Cook‟s Archigram have provided us with No-Stop City (1969), Continuous Monument (1967) and Plug-in City (1964), respectively, as some of the most enigmatic and radical visions of the future: mega structures with no buildings, only massive frameworks without boundaries.

New Babylon (1966)

No-Stop City(1969)

4.1. Archigram: Archigram, a highly experimental, productive, and often excessive group formed in London in the 1960s. Archigram combined a renewed interest in technology with an unrestrained and

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 6

sometimes senseless program to keep modernism from further inching towards a banal and safe reality.

Archigram's buildings were excitingly playful, hyper-consumerist, and technologically driven, largely as a means to reinvigorate the profession. Unlike many of their contemporaries, Archigram's idealized visions were manifested as collages in a series of magazines. Images from popular culture were affixed onto abstract cityscapes, in a form of pastiche that retaliated against the conservative, well-mannered nature of British modernism.

The group ignored contemporary notions of what could be built, and instead indulged itself with largely technocratic and completely unbuildable visions that drew inspiration from advances in technology and culture—like the launching of the first cosmonaut into space.

Embracing a program of constant change, Archigram founding members Peter Cook, Warren Chalk, and Dennis Crompton designed the Plug-In City in 1964. Like its name suggests, Plug-In City detailed a huge infrastructural network that allowed for modular residential units to literally plug into the system. Cranes and an intricate web of railways could transport and drop the units into the network, which contained access ways and essential services. And while its name suggests otherwise, Plug-In City was in fact the opposite of a traditional city, a continuously evolving mega structure rooted in obsolescence that contained no permanent buildings. Plug-In City glamorized a new faith in machines and technology that was based on infinite supplies and hyper-consumption, and rejected any notion of conventional architecture.

4.2. Centricity – Lebbeus Woods The most imaginative of all the utopian visionaries— both in principle and design—was Lebbeus Woods.

Though he started out his career working in the offices of Eero Saarinen, Woods never received a degree or license to practice architecture—which went totally against a modernist tradition, and most likely led to his ideas being even more experimental and unorthodox.

Woods‘ designs addressed systems in crisis, like wartorn Zagreb and Sarajevo, and an earthquake-damaged San Francisco. One of his imaginative plans shows mystifying structures rising out of and constructed from the ruins of an earthquake, while another places a sprawling city beneath East and West Berlin to provide a space for citizens to escape the isolating realities above ground and reconnect with one another.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 7

Woods‘ experimental ideas bled over into urban planning as well. In the late 1980s, Woods published a series of drawings called Centricity—essentially a utopian city unrestricted by any set of conventions or rules. Entirely speculative in theory, the buildings in Centricity were drawn merely to challenge what architecture could do and why we build.

Many structures are totally illegible or have completely ambiguous functions, like a surreal zeppelin-like structure made from scrap material aimlessly hovering in the sky. Starting in the 1970s, Woods drew more than 200 elaborately detailed and overtly hypothetical structures; only one of his plans was ever built. For Woods, utopia existed more in freeing the mind from the physical and psychological constraints of society—a revolutionary concept that boldly disrupted the modernist need to rationalize, classify, and make sense of the world around.

5. BUILDINGS INSPIRED FROM FAILED UTOPIAN CONCEPTS OF ARCHITECTS: Utopian ideas, or at least their spatial manifestations, seem to be getting easier to realize nowadays. The development of the Persian Gulf states, American urban sprawl, the European museum cities and China‘s urbanization all show that ―we do not merely want to dream - we want to live in dreams.‖ The temptation of the unknown, or rather the natural attraction towards change and evolution, has led visionary minds to construct ideal projections of future societies: paradises inhabited by man and governed by the laws of harmony and prosperity. No-where places!

Some of the most famous cities in history were never built. These Utopian cities may have been failures, but they expressed our ideas about what the future of human civilization could look like. And many ideas contained in them continue to influence us today.

5.1. Octagon City, the Vegetarian Utopia: City designer Henry Clubb, designed eight roads would lead away from a central octagonal town square. From there, the city would be made up of four octagon villages, complete with octagon farmhouses, town squares, and public buildings. The only building was a 16 x 16 windowless log cabin. The settlers who stayed faced a multitude of problems, including lack of water when the local spring dried up, mosquitoes and disease. Nothing remains of the town today, but Clubb's legacy lives on in the handful of octagon houses that remain in the US and Canada.

5.2. Le Corbusier and Utopia: Le Corbusier had big plans for the ideal city. In the early twentieth century, he hit upon an idea he called "Purism."

Architecture, he believed, should be as efficient and simple as the industrial machines that had ushered in the modern age. Inspired by this notion, he planned two modern utopias modeled on this idea of the city as machine: the Ville Radieuse and the Ville Contemporainehe Ville Radieuse, dubbed the "vertical garden city," also included a

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 8

social plan. His buildings, like Fowlers octagons, would let in lots of natural sunlight and air.

The buildings would also be the center of social life, with rooftop gardens and beaches, as well as catering in the basement and professional childcare for each family. He imagined that each building would contain 2,700 people, all working 5-hour days, using public transit that delivered them right to their homes.

5.2.1. Unite d'habitation: Le Corbusier used the principles behind his machine cities when designing Unité d'Habitation in Marseilles. The building still stands today, and some residents even open their apartments up for tours of the uniquely designed living space. Unite d'Habitation in 1947, Europe was still feeling the effects of the Second World War, when Le Corbusier was commissioned to design a multi-family residential housing project for the people of Marseille with nearly 1,600 residents divided among eighteen floors, Interestingly enough, the majority of the communal aspects do not occur within the building; rather they are placed on the roof.

The roof becomes a garden terrace that has a running track, a club, a kindergarten, a gym, and a shallow pool. Beside the roof, there are shops, medical facilities, and even a small hotel distributed throughout the interior of the building. The Unite d‟ Habitation is essentially a ―city within a city‖ that is spatially, as well as, functionally optimized for the residents.

5.3. Where Everything Is Locally Made: In 1932 Frank Lloyd Wright saw plans for Ville Radieuse. He hated it, and quickly began developing his own ideal city based on his love of the open, rural prairies of the midwest. Wright wanted to get rid of industrial cities entirely, replacing them with urban spaces that were a mix of developed and rural areas. In Broadacre City, each family would be given an acre of land, and the largest "villages" would have no more than 10,000 people. Public needs like water and power would never be privately owned. ―Imagine spacious landscaped highways …giant roads, themselves great architecture, pass public service stations, no longer eyesores, expanded to include all kinds of service and comfort. They unite and separate — separate and unite the series of diversified units, the farm units, the factory units, the roadside markets, and the garden schools, the dwelling places (each on its acre of individually adorned and cultivated ground.

Broadacre City was never built, but continues to inspire land use planners to this day.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 9

5.4. Arcosanti In 1970, Soleri established Arcosanti, a continuously developing experimental community in Arizona based on the principles of arcology. Each year flocks of Soleri-advocates come to Arcosanti to pursue and explore theories of the compact city and alternatives to urban sprawl.

The goal of Arcosanti is to explore the concept of arcology, which combines architecture and ecology. The town has the goals of combining the social interaction and accessibility of an urban environment with sound environmental principles, such as minimal resource use and access to the natural environment.

The project is building an experimental town on 25 acres (10 ha) of a 4,060-acre (1,640 ha) land preserve.

Construction broke ground at the site in 1970, and has continued at a varying pace through the present. The most recently completed building was finished in 1989. The population varies between 50 and 150 people, based on the number of students and volunteers on the site. Ultimately, the town is planned to have 5,000 people. Thirteen major structures have been built on the site, some several stories tall. The latest master plan, designed in 2001, envisions a massive complex, called "Arcosanti 5000‖, which would dwarf the current buildings.

6. INFERENCE ON UTOPIAN DEVELOPMENT: Utopia then was considered to be a fantasy. It stayed in the literature leaving the traces to the future.

There were few successful utopian concepts used in the present architecture. In the past they consider utopia as a very imaginative things that can never happen or be built. Le Corbusier broke the rule and showed the people it was possible. Now, with a booming technology, we can never be quite sure how our future will look.

Understanding that fact we can say the present scenario of architectural technology is thriving to grow and create something extraordinary. Then again, the utopian concepts left by these

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 10

architects might work out some day. The present state of architecture is driven to develop mega structures. They want to prove a conventional city with the abundant technology. The gigantic unrealistic living units are coming up with an idea of perfect society. Here, we could say that Le Corbusier‘s dreams are coming true. They want to construct the future transforming the ideology to a concrete form with the extravagant and interesting physical structure.

7. ARCHITECTURE IN CINEMA: Visual language can convey facts and ideas in a wider and deeper range than almost any other means of communication. It can reinforce the static verbal concept with the sensory vitality of dynamic imagery. It can interpret the new understanding of the physical world and social events because dynamic interrelationships and interpenetration, which are significant of every advanced scientific understanding of today, are intrinsic idioms of the contemporary vehicles of visual communication: photography, motion pictures, and television

7.1 Film: The Third Dimension in Motion: For the last century, the medium of film has allowed increased understanding and appreciation of the realistic, three-dimensional occupation of architectural and urban spaces that previously existed as captives of word and two-dimensional representation. These would include not only the reconstructions of actual historic places, but also visionary or imaginary places.

7.2 Overlap Analysis: For the last century, the medium of film has allowed increased understanding and appreciation of the realistic, three-dimensional occupation of architectural and urban spaces that previously existed as captives of word and twodimensional representation.

These would include not only the reconstructions of actual historic places, but also visionary or imaginary places.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 11

7.3. Understanding Spaces in Cinema There are usually types of spaces in science-fiction films: futuristic, retro, dystopian or modernist.

The futuristic, space-age dwellings are mostly white, in which tables and chairs might hover above the floor and doors slide open automatically with a hum. This was the default style of the mid-20th century. It has been used less frequently in recent years.

Retro, in which the architecture of the future resembles a version of the past, embrace everything from steampunk Victoriana to the kind of fantasies in which other planets look like Tolkienised England or Tunisian mud brick villages. More commonly, though, the look is some kind of art deco revival, which is probably to do with the extraordinary skyscrapers of 1920s and 1930s New York still looking like an ideal city of the future.

Dystopian, meanwhile, tend to show a world of ruins and apocalyptic landscapes.

The fourth type of home in a sci-fi film: the already built, real-world modernist – not too well-known, strange but also familiar enough to correspond with some futuristic vision. The first type is, unexpectedly perhaps, most often the dullest. This is because it is generally the most predictable. Nothing, the cliché states, dates faster than the future.

Oblivion has featured characters living in strikingly uninspired modernist dwellings that tell us little about our ambitions for the future, except that its interiors will be, of course, very white. Many film-makers return to familiar landscapes, instead, believing that the partial destruction of the kind of landscapes we inhabit is more disturbing than some notion of a minimalist suburbia.

These decaying indicate a dying, dysfunctional society; often inhabitants only take shelter in the ruins, moving on to find food or escape danger. In this way, the houses lose the most important thing they give us (beyond shelter) – a sense of belonging, safety and of home.

Interestingly, that sense of decay – the flaking walls, bare bricks, leaking plumbing and puddles on the floor – has also become a staple backdrop of the horror genre, the interior indicating a state of moral as well as physical decay. Our inability to imagine the aesthetic of the future is partly a result of our saturation with images of the future from the past, often from our own childhoods.

The future looks like outer space to us (the assumption being that the world has been destroyed or at least polluted beyond repair), so it can be difficult to imagine the earthbound house of the future. That is why production designers have used either those collective memories and placed us in a version of the future filtered through the past or in an actual building that was either ahead of its time or so weird it doesn‘t seem to fit into the existing world.

What do these interiors tell us, these strange reoccurrences of the familiar in the future? The white and glass futurism of the space house is too far removed from our everyday experience.

To make us feel truly unsettled the future needs to take place in homes we recognize, yet are different – decayed or ruined, perhaps, or with added high-tech devices. In other words, they give a perfect blend of fantasy and the familiar.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 12

LITERATURE STUDY OF UTOPIAN CITIES FROM COMIC MOVIES

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 13

8. INFLUENCES OF ARCHITECTURAL STYLES: The following case studies depict various architectural styles involved in the development of the city and how these styles were merged and resulted in the interesting structures with an utopian city. This utopian city so obtained was either constructed digital or physically for the particular movie.

8.1 Gotham City – Batman Series: Gotham City (GOTH-əm) is a fictional utopian city appearing in comic books published by DC Comics, best known as the home of Batman. This was later adapted in the movie.

Gotham City was named by Batman writer Bill Finger. When he was asked about how he chose the name ―Gotham‖. Gotham City could be anywhere. Of course, ―Gotham had long been a well-known nickname for New York City – even prior to Batman‘s introduction in 1939, which explains why ―Gotham Jewellers‖ and many other businesses in New York City have the word ―Gotham‖ in them. The nickname was first popularized in the nineteenth century. New York Times journalist William Safire described Gotham City as "New York below 14th Street, from Soho to Greenwich Village, the Bowery, Little Italy, Chinatown, and the sinister areas around the base of the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges."

Artist, illustrator, the cartographer of Gotham, Eliot R. Brown, has no formal training in cartography, but he did study architecture and had previously worked as a technical artist for Marvel Comics, where, as he told me, he was the closest thing they had to an ―in-house architect and architectural renderer (and weapons designer and aerospace engineer).‖ Denny O‟Neil, a legendary comics writer and long-time Batman editor, he was faced with an even bigger request: design one of the most iconic cities in comics history. O‟Neil wanted a map of Gotham as part of an in-house ―bible‖ to help coordinate the various comics. The DC Comics editors made it clear that Gotham City was an idealized version of Manhattan.

8.1.1 City Planning The city called for sophistication and a seamy side. A business district, fine residences, entertainment, meat packing, garment district, docks and their dockside business. In short all of Manhattan and Brooklyn was used as the basic idea to develop the city.

Uptown: Uptown is mostly considered to be the place most middle-class and affluent citizens of Gotham hang their hats. It also contains the headquarters for a number of international diplomatic missions and businesses. The docks along the north eastern corner bring in a significant percentage of the city is money and wealth.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 14

Midtown: Unrealistic Living Units: The Narrows The heart of Gotham, Midtown is where you will find the best and worst the city has to offer. From glistening high rises to the seedy lower levels, affluence to abject poverty. It all depends on where you look. At the centre of the city stands Wayne Tower, a symbol of hope, a marker of the past and a beacon for the future of Gotham. All roads lead to Wayne Tower.

Downtown: Mega Structures: The largest island in Gotham is also the busiest. While Midtown may be the heart of the city, downtown is where one reads its pulse. From business fronts to tenement buildings to factories, it has it all. Most of Gotham's residents live, work and play here.

8.1.2 Layout of the City: Attempt to provide Conventional City: The grid plan, grid street plan or grid iron plan is a type of city plan in which streets run at right angles to each other, forming a grid. The original design plan of grid iron planning: • A very large block measuring 113m by 113m (370 x370 feet), far larger than the old city blocks and larger than any Roman, Greek blocks.

• A 20 m (66 feet) road width (right of way) compared to mostly 3 m in the old city.

• Square blocks with truncated corners; • Major roads, perpendicular and diagonal, measuring 50 m (164 feet) in width.

This same ideology was taken to develop the city of Gotham.

8.1.3 Skyline Analysis – Physical Structure: Pattern: The skyline section defines the city into three sections: •The uptown in the left most •Then midtown in the center and •The downtown.

The uptown and downtown are skyscraper forests where as the midtown is a multiuse space.

All these parts of the city are connected to the Wayne tower.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 15

Balance: Visual Balance: There is a particular rhythm in the uptown and downtown that is followed repeatedly and midtown acts as mayhem of Asylum, Narrows and legendary Wayne tower.

Material Balance: Concrete cut building followed through out SKYLINE 1:

Uptown Gotham City has high variation in high rise elevation  

Gives multiple concave skyline curvature Defined outline line of the structures

SKYLINE 2:

In Midtown Gotham City there is medium variation in the elevation  Gives convex skyline  Wayne Tower as the central elemental emphasis.  SKYLINE 3:

The abstract depicts the Narrows of Gotham City  

Low variations of the skyline Flat skyline with distinct rooflines.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 16

8.1.4. Emphasis: The center of the city, both geographically and economically, is Wayne Tower. From it, all of Wayne Enterprises various subsidiaries are run. ―All roads lead to the tower, as well as the sewer mains, the rail system, and the power grid.‖ Because of this, it is also one of the most secure locations in the city.

8.1.5 Central Focus Wayne tower acts the central focus of the city as the city‘s water main and electrical channels are under the building. Subways transit radiates from the building as well as most of road network also connect to this tower, thereby making it the unofficial center of Gotham city.

8.1.6 Movement: Technology: A Monorail is a railway in which the track consists of a single rail, typically elevated.

The term is also used to describe the beam of the system, or the vehicles travelling on such a beam or track. Gotham City planners have certainly managed to provide for some better inter-borough subway connections than we have in New York, and their subway system runs to Batman‘s equivalent of Staten Island.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 17

8.1.7 Architectural Style – Gothic Architecture •Gothic architecture is a style of architecture that flourished during the high and late medieval period.

•As an architectural style, Gothic developed primarily in ecclesiastical architecture, and its principals and characteristic forms were applied to other types of buildings.

•Buildings of every type were constructed in the Gothic style, with evidence remaining of simple domestic buildings, elegant town houses, grand palaces, commercial premises, civic buildings, castles, city walls, bridges, Village churches, abbey churches, abbey complexes and large cathedrals.

Verticality: One of the fundamental characteristics of gothic architecture was its height. New building techniques (such as the flying buttress, detailed below) enabled architects to spread the weight of taller walls and loftier towers.

This all meant that gothic buildings could, quite literally, scale new heights. It allowed them to reach up to the heavens - perfect for cathedrals and churches.

The Flying Buttress: 46th St. Promenade looking South to the Gardner Overpass,

by Anton Furst, production designer who won an Academy Award for designing the nightmare version of Gotham City in Tim Burton's Batman (1989) In the times before gothic architecture, Early Medieval architects struggled to spread the weight of heavy stone walls. This meant that most towers needed to be short, and buildings thin, otherwise the sheer weight of higher levels (or large rooms and halls) would collapse into themselves.

The flying buttress is the defining external characteristic of gothic architecture. These buttresses effectively spread the weight of the new designs, taking the weight off the walls and transferring force directly to the ground. Rather than just being a simple support, buttresses were often elaborately designed and extremely decorative. They appeared to dart

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 18

and sweep around each building, giving a sense of movement and of grandeur missing from previous architectural designs.

The Pointed Arch: The pointed arch was the defining internal characteristic of gothic architecture. The pointed arch effectively distributed the force of heavier ceilings and bulkier designs, and could support much more weight than previous, simple pillars.

One of the most distinctive characteristics of Gothic architecture is the expansive area of the windows. It emphasized light, bright windows and airy interiors, transforming castles and churches into majestic environments.

Gargoyles: Gargoyles are decorative, monstrous little creatures, perched at along the roofs and battlements of gothic buildings and castles. Gargoyles have a practical purpose: rainwater to drain off the roof and gush through their mouths, before plummeting to the ground. Gargoyles had another intended purpose: to strike fear into the hearts of ill-educated medieval peasants, scaring them into the church or cathedral.

8.1.8. Architectural Style – Art Deco This style is an influential visual arts design style. The style is often characterized by rich colors, bold geometric shapes, and lavish ornamentation. Art Deco designs are characterized by trapezoidal, zigzagged, and triangular shapes, chevron patterns, stepped forms, sweeping curves and sunburst motifs. Art Deco look signaled something of a return to the symmetry and simplicity of Neoclassicism, but without its classical regularity.

8.1.9. Inference Architecture for Cinema The aesthetic side, the emerging references, of the city of Gotham, appears increasingly confined to the reality of American architecture and urbanism with their tendency to choose styles defined for specific functions:

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 19

•Gothic Revival for residential building, •Art Deco for skyscrapers, •The White City for public buildings and banks.

Thereby, the city develops to a utopian space with mega structures. There are not only references to real architecture, some of the comic vignettes seem to trace the designs outlined

by Hugh Ferriss (an American and architect), for the early batman movies and the scenes take up the atmospheres from the first photographs at the turn of nineteenth century and the effects of light of Albert Speer.

Cinema for Architecture Designs for the new 910,000sq ft development on Leaden hall Street – nicknamed Gotham City- were unveiled by Henderson Global Investors, which owns the site. Its design is said to be inspired by American 20th century architecture, which influenced Tim Burton‘s movie depiction of Gotham City in the Batman films.

Extract from Sky News, London (2:15pm UK, Tuesday 17 September 2013).

A new 10-storey, sustainable headquarters for PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP by Foster + Partners Visible from all sides, the building does not have an obvious ‗front‘ or ‗back‘.

The zigzag facades screen the interiors but allow daylight to penetrate the office floors. A sequence of external louvers animate the glazed facades, capturing and projecting light and colors inside and creating a sparkling effect on the building‘s outer skin.

To further maximize daylight and views, the building‘s symmetrical wings open towards the river to reveal the open circular drum at its core. Three curved bridges, at levels 2, 5 and 8, connect the two wings, while the southern elevation drops to 7 storeys to respect the height of the buildings along Tooley Street.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 20

8.2 ASGARD CITY – THOR SERIES Asgard is a fictional realm within the Marvel Comics universe based on the Asgard of Norse mythology and is home to the Asgardians and other beings of Norse mythology.

Asgard features prominently in stories that follow Marvel's super heroic adaptation of the Norse God Thor.

•The name Asgard stems from the Scandinavian mythology.

•Asgard is the abode of the celestials, Utgard is the abode of the giants. Midgard is between the two -- better than Utgard, but inferior to Asgard. Midgard is the abode of the first pair, from whom sprang the human race.

•The kingdom of Asgard is the land surrounding and encompassing the city of Asgard, nestled within the Asgard Mountains and the Sea of Marmora. Except for the denselypopulated city of Asgard, the kingdom is a rolling green meadow dotted with small farms.

8.2.1. The Norse Myth: •Asgard is a small planetary body that serves as home to the Asgardians, a race of beings recognised on Earth by humans as the deities of their Norse mythology, such as Thor, and their ruler, Odin.

•It exists in another dimensional plane and is about the size of a small state. It is not round like the Earth, does not spin on its axis, and does not revolve around the sun.

•It is a flat, asteroid-like mass that has a top surface with a gravitational pull, similar to that of the Earth, in order to keep the citizens and their cities from floating into the void.

•The matter on Asgard is also denser and more durable than the matter on Earth. There is an unknown force that keeps the surfaces of Asgard from eroding and from allowing its bodies of water from drifting off into space.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 21

• There are natural nexus portals that exist on Asgard, due to deposits of the wormholesensitive crystal-like material (Rainbow Bridge).

8.2.2. Architectural Aspects Asgard is a very large and scenic city with long wide boulevards, many small and large palace halls, small city parks and the great wall that is surrounding the most of the city.

Inside of the lengthy city walls stands one other unique palace hall. It is a dome that is made of crystal, contrasts with the usual Romanesque style of Asgardian architecture.

Central Focus Towering at a giddy height in the centre of the city rose Odin‟s seat, called Air Throne, from where he could see over the whole earth.

8.2.3. Asgard City Planning: 

Bifrost



Heimdall‘s Observatory



Valhalla



Hall Of Asgard:



Palace Of Frigga And Gladsheim

Bifrost Bifröst or sometimes Bilröst or Bivrost, is a burning rainbow bridge that reaches between Midgard (the world) and Asgard, the realm of the Gods. The bridge is attested as Bilröst in the Poetic Edda; compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources.

Scholar Andy Orchard posits that Bifröst may mean "shimmering path." He notes that the first element of Bilröst—bil (meaning "a moment")— "suggests the fleeting nature of the rainbow," which he connects to the first element of Bifröst—the Old Norse verb bifa (meaning "to shimmer" or "to shake")— noting that the element provokes notions of the "lustrous sheen" of the bridge. Bifröst either means "the swaying road to heaven" "the fleetingly glimpsed rainbow".

Heimdall’s Observatory

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 22

Heimdall‘s Observatory is where Heimdall (Norse Guard) watches over all of the realms and activates the Bifrost Bridge.

Valhalla The pyramid shape of Odin's castle: Odinâ€&#x;s palace - Valhalla, a manytiered structure resembling a towering pipe organ - at the center of the city.

The city develops radically around Valhalla. The perfectly shimmering castle towers over the city with its beauty.

Hall Of Asgard: The halls of Asgard have been built to withstand the onslaught of giants, and said to contain the entire population of the city. The exact location of this hall is protected.

Palace Of Frigga and Gladsheim On one side of the Air Throne stood the Palace of Friends where Frigga was to live; on the other raised the glittering Gladsheim, a banqueting palace roofed entirely with golden shields.

8.2.4. Skyline Analysis:

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 23

Physical Structure Pattern: The skyline section defines the city in a convex curvature with medium variations. The mountains guard the city and form a layer at the farther most end. The highest point of the curvature is the Valhalla, providing elemental focus to the golden palace. Rainbow Bridge and Bifrost from the gateway.

Balance Visual Balance: The city syncs into an otherworldly, shimmering citadel, surrounded by thousands of monuments in a land where the weather is always perfect.

Material Balance: 

Golden material



Shimmering monuments and



Citadels.

Emphasis: Valhalla Valhalla, Hall of the Slain, in Norse mythology is the hall presided over by Odin. This vast hall has five hundred and forty doors. The rafters are spears, the hall is roofed with shields and breast-plates litter the benches. A wolf guards the western door and an eagle hovers over it.

8.2.5. Architectural Styles Characteristics Architecture:

of

Romanesque

Romanesque Architecture The walls of Romanesque buildings are often of massive thickness with few and comparatively small openings. They are often double shells, filled with rubble. The building stone was often used in comparatively small and irregular pieces, bedded in thick mortar.

Ribbed vaults Ribbed vaults, when used, are large, square and domical, spanning two bays. Portals are sometimes covered by an open porch supported on two columns standing on the backs of lions. Shallow relief carving in marble was a feature of some façade.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 24

Buttresses Because of the massive nature of Romanesque walls, buttresses are not a highly significant feature; Romanesque buttresses are generally of flat square profile and do not project a great deal beyond the wall.

Columns Columns are an important structural feature of Romanesque architecture. Columns and attached shafts are also used structurally and for decoration. Monolithic columns cut from a single piece of stone.

Arcade An arcade is a row of arches, supported on piers or columns. They occur in the interior of large churches, separating the nave from the aisles, and in large secular interiors spaces, such as the great hall of a castle.

Drum Columns In most parts of Europe, Romanesque columns were massive, as they supported thick upper walls with small windows, and sometimes heavy vaults. The most common method of construction was to build them out of stone cylinders called drums.

Scandinavian Architecture The scenes that featured the realm of Asgard, a lot of carvings adorning the walls, doors, floors and furniture, these were obviously heavily influenced by the same carvings of the Viking troops. The set design has taken influence from traditional Viking carvings.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 25

8.2.6. Inference Architecture for Cinema The aesthetic side, the emerging references, of the City of Asgard, appear increasingly confined to the mythical environment of other worldly citadels and wide monuments with combination of various architectural styles defined for specific functions: •Romanesque for interiors of palace, •Scandinavian architecture for the detailing, •The modernist sophisticated look with a touch of byzantine and Romanesque for exteriors.

Thereby, the utopian city with unique antique mythical touch is developed. Asgard is meant to be very old, yet very advanced.

Kenneth Branagh‘s direction, and that of Marvel studio troop, who were also very involved in developing the look of Asgard, was always toward a minimal, yet very sophisticated look.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 26

LITERATURE STUDY OF FUTURISTIC CITIES FROM COMIC MOVIES

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 27

9. LITERATURE STUDY OF FUTURISTIC CITIES FROM COMIC MOVIES The utopian concepts resemble or sometimes are identical to designs seen and observed from existing structures. Thereby, understanding that architecture and cinema are interdependent and interconnected where both learn from each other. Architects, among others get influenced by things that happen in art. In the end, the study should draw out the inspiration and concepts to guide the architects in the development of futuristic designs. Also, synthesizing and differentiating the possible utopian structures.

9.1 Xandar City Xandar is the homeworld of the Xandarians and the main headquarters of the Nova. Corps Xandar is a futuristic utopia populated by millions of life forms.

Appearance: Guardian of the Galaxy Movie Environment Inspirations: Architecture of Santiago Calatrava; Singapore‘s Gardens by the Bay

9.1.1. Influence and Development of Xandar Xandar is the brightest environment in the film and was created almost entirely on computer.

The planet nonetheless has a very real inspiration the architecture of the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, specifically the gorgeous steel, white concrete and glass arch of the Liege train station he designed in Belgium.

Xandar is based in many ways on Singapore and Gardens by the Bay which has that lush, kind of futuristic feel in terms of architecture and a very lush tropical feel. One of the main buildings in the city is actually a train station in Belgium that we went and scanned and photographed. ―We always tried to use stuff from the real world but modify it.”- from production notes.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 28

The version was built first, with the studio relying mostly on V-Ray unless there were interactions with spaceships or explosions, in which case RenderMan was used. In addition to the Singapore reference, VFX photographer was sent to Shanghai and Dubai. ―We wanted to have something that makes sense but at the same time it would have an edge and something that would make you believe it was extra-terrestrial and not just out of bounds.‖ “We‟d take pieces of the buildings and create another whole one using say windows or shapes or the facade of the building. We had 40 or 50 hero buildings designed and modeled. And we did more generic ones too.

We ended up with hundreds of variations of buildings and populated the city that way. Then we had to create trees and vegetation. So we kept it grounded. We have trees that make visual sense but at the same time we were creating alientype plants and flowers that could be added to the vegetation – like a palm tree but a spherical variation.”- From production notes.

9.1.2. Santiago Calatrava Santiago Calatrava Valls, born 28 July 1951 is a Spanish neo-futuristic architect, structural engineer, sculptor and painter. He is responsible for many landmark buildings and monuments around the world. Designs from Santiago Calatrava included Bridges, Train Stations, Skyscrapers, Exposition Halls, Towers, Schools, and Museums.

Santiago Calatrava believed that there are two overriding principles to be found in nature which are most appropriate for building: one is the optimal use of material, the other the capacity of organisms to change shape, to grow, and to move.

9.1.3. Characteristic Architectural Style Followed By Santiago Calatrava Inspiration was derived from human figure and nature‘s creativity. Experimentation with materials and their properties blends impressive visual style and the strict rules of engineering Symbolic and recognizable the world over for the sense of movement captured in a stationary object. Design contained long sweeping lines, stark white materials and a flawless use of glass and light. Has a definite vision of inside and outside, the concave and convex, of how we face the specific world.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 29

Form 

Simplicity



Nature inspired



Harmony

Inspirations 

Human body parts



Animals and birds



Motion of waves



Birds



Illusion



Bone and skeletal system

Structure 

Visual expression



Dynamism



Challenge

Materials 

White Concrete



Steel



Glass



Light and efficient

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 30

9.1.4. Gardens by the Bay, Singapore Building type: cultural landscape, park/green area Support structure construction

construction,

construction:

frame

Facade construction: building envelope Support structure material: steel/aluminium Facade material: metal, glass, steel Roof material: metal, glass, steel Topic: GREEN, digital processes, roof construction Why in Xandar? Xanadar was developed with tropical setting of the Singapore‘s Gardens by the bay with futuristic gardens and magnificent structures that can be easily mirrored with Santiago‘s works.

Xandar is largely based on Singapore‘s Gardens by the Bay. "Xandar is based in many ways on Singapore," said overall visual effects

supervisor Stephane Ceretti, who had a hand in developing Xandar. Ceretti explained how the landmark, built on 101-hectares of reclaimed land, inspired the computerised set, FXguide reported. "There‘s a place there called Gardens by the Bay which has that lush, kind of futuristic feel in terms of architecture and a very lush tropical feel.- News Extract, The New Paper, August 14, 2014 The design was a series of large tropical leaf-shaped gardens, each with its own specific landscaping design, character and theme. There are five water inlets aligned with the prevailing wind direction, maximizing and extending the shoreline while allowing wind and water to penetrate the site to help cool areas of activity around them. Bay East Garden provide visitors with an unobstructed view of the city skyline. Upcoming developments of Bay East Garden will be based on the theme of water.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 31

9.1.5. Santiago Calatrava Influence on Xandar City

The Nova Corps world Xandar in the science fiction, comic film Guardians of the Galaxy is largely based on his designs Notable in the movie, the structures had a great influence of Santiago‘s works.

The Nova Corps Head Quarters in the movie is the massive structure with a major visual expression. The city somehow works out around the logo of Nova corps. The city has a touch of tropical feel to it. Xandar again is depicted in white and neutral shades leading to Santiago‘s excessive white concrete material usage. The city has a multi numerous numbers of water bodies and these futuristic floating bridges that look like it had been adapted from Calatrava‘s concepts. These bridges are digital exaggerated and made to look like a spine structures similar to bone structures of Santiago‘s works. The VFX artists have made a clear depiction of physical expression of human and animal forms for the city.

They tried to merge in the tropical setting with the white environment giving out a visual appeal.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 32

10. PRESENT SCENARIO OF FUTURISTIC STRUCTURES Art and Science Pavilions for 8th China Flower Expo Pavilion of Art: (Competition 1st Prize) Architect: Lab Architecture Location: Wujin, China Year of completion: 2013 Function: Exhibition gallery + multimedia center “The art and science pavilions by Lab Architecture Studio in collaboration with Chris Yiu-hang Chan and Stephanie Mee-lee Tan were recently completed in Wujin, China. The project won first prize in the 8th China Flower Expo competition, which aims to promote sustainable design”. — bustler.net Located on the West Tai-hu Lake, the design for the 8th Chinese Flower Expo pavilions explores the aesthetics of the relationship between the water and the petal. Also experiment the tension between the Natural landscape and the iconic culture body.

The designs of the two related pavilions (Art Exhibition Pavilion, Science Exhibition Pavilion) draw upon the natural geographical features of the area and use ecological building design principles to improve the relationship between art, architecture, and the environment whilst furthering the Flower Expo building society‘s view to promote sustainability and the natural ecology.

To create a performance orientated building as the very primitive intention, both pavilions have a 140 + meter expanse of sweeping, curvilinear forms constructed of tri grid steel members; with more than 8000 control points (5000+ for science pavilion, 3800+ for art pavilion), in association with highly translucent ETFE weatherproof membrane, shielding the 2-storey exhibition halls underneath, which could reduce the heat gains during mid-noon in summer. The zigzagged in house façade promotes the possibility of passive ventilation in the galleries.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 33

Water Discus Underwater Hotels: Dubai is already the home of the world‘s most luxurious hotel, the Burj Al Arab, and if Polish company Deep Ocean Technology has its way it will be the location of the world‘s first underwater hotel.

Dubai is arguably the luxury capital of the world, so it's hardly surprising that the United Arab Emirates wants to create the largest undersea hotel in the world. Dubai unveiled its plans in 2012, and the above-water portion of the proposed Water Discus hotel looks like an opulent cluster of UFOs -- albeit with a sunbathing deck.

Below the surface will be 21 luxury rooms, a lavish lobby and a training pool for scuba diving. The designer, Deep Ocean Technology, aims to launch several Water Discus hotels around the world -- the Maldives announced plans for its own Discus in June 2013.

A single Water Discus is an independent structure with a usable area of approximately 1000 m2 fully equipped to ensure a high level of safety and comfort. It can serve as an individual module - a component of a bigger complex. A number of such individual modules may be used to build a hotel complex of minimum 2000 m2, which can be further extended with additional modules (1000 - 1500 m2 each). The aforementioned complex may be constructed anywhere in the world.

Each design will be tailor-made to suit its future users and local conditions, such as the shape of the coastal line and depth of water around the coral reef.

If any changes in environmental or economic conditions occur, the Water Discus modules can be transferred to a different place. This offers a unique opportunity to live underwater on a permanent basis with unlimited options to change locations. The mobility makes changes in interior design of a hotel much easier, as any disc can be detached and replaced with a new one.

Foster + Partner’s new Apple Campus in Cupertino Exceed economic, social, and environmental sustainability goals through integrated design and development.

The new documents confirm Foster + Partners as the architects, working with ARUP North America and Kier & Wright, a local civil engineering

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 34

firm that has worked on Apple‘s current campus and buildings for other tech companies (eBay, Nvidia, Cisco, Netflix and Sun, among others).

About the program: 

An Office, Research and Development Building comprising approximately 2.8 million square feet for up to 13,000 employees



A 1,000 seat Corporate Auditorium



A Corporate Fitness Center



Research Facilities comprising approximately 300,000 square feet



A Central Plant



Associated Parking

“It‟s a pretty amazing building.

It‟s a little like a spaceship landed. It‟s got this gorgeous courtyard in the middle… It‟s a circle. It‟s curved all the way around. If you build things, this is not the cheapest way to build something. There is not a straight piece of glass in this building. It‟s all curved. We‟ve used our experience making retail buildings all over the world now, and we know how to make the biggest pieces of glass in the world for architectural use. And, we want to make the glass specifically for this building here. We can make it curve all the way around the building… It‟s pretty cool.”

- Steve Jobs

Kingdom Tower, Jeddah Construction started: Jan 13, 2008 Architectural style: Skyscraper Architecture firm: Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture Architect: Adrian Smith.

The triangular footprint and sloped exterior of Kingdom Tower is designed to reduce wind loads; its high surface area also makes it ideal for residential units. The overall design of the tower, which

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 35

will be located near both the Red Sea and the mouth of the Obhur Creek (Sharm Ob'hur) where it widens as it meets the Red Sea, as well as having frontage on a man-made waterway and harbor that will be built around it, is intended to look like a desert plant shooting upwards as a symbol of Saudi Arabia's growth and future, as well as to add prominence to Jeddah's status as the gateway into the holy city of Mecca. The designer's vision was ―one that represents the new spirit in Saudi Arabia" (Smith). The 23 hectare (57 acre) area around Kingdom Tower will contain public space and a shopping mall, as well as other residential and commercial developments, and be known as the Kingdom Tower Water Front District, of which, the tower's site alone will take up 500,000 m2 (5,381,955 sq ft).

Samsung HQ Location: San Jose, USA The campus will be comprised of a 10-story tower, an amenity pavilion and parking garage. The design encourages interaction among staff, invites the community on campus and attracts employees in the highly competitive tech market, which is growing at a faster pace than overall employment.

The building will be set close to the street edge at the intersection of North First and East Tasman Drive, with cafes and a Samsung expo at the corner. The design includes a white metal, glass and terracotta exterior; a parking structure covered in a folding green-colored wall; and courtyards that include fitness facilities, artwork, and cafes — some of which will be open to the public. The tower, with its height and unique form, will create a powerful brand image for Samsung.

The tower will house 2,000 Samsung employees and will be divided into two sections: R&D and sales. A courtyard will connect the building together, creating a central gathering place.

In a rarity for high-rise workspace, each Samsung employee will be no further than one floor

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 36

away from green space. Amenities such as grab-and-go dining facilities and a fitness center will also be centrally located.

The headquarters will also be a highly energyefficient building. For example, a rooftop solar array on the parking garage will provide renewable energy; the tower‘s façade is designed to reduce solar heat gain, which reduces energy costs related to cooling a building; clear glass will allow natural light deep into the floor plate; and trees and water features will provide connections to the environment.

Amanora Apartment City - Future Towers Location: Pune, India.

Status: On going MVRDV has broken ground on what they consider as Phase I of a truly revolutionary vertical city.

Amanora is a large (4.3 million sq ft) mixed-use development which will include affordable housing as well as a variety of amenities (herb gardens, courtyards, etc) designed to make vertical living comfortable and eco-friendly.

The Future Towers project introduces lost qualities to mass housing: increased density combined with amenities, public facilities, parks and a mix of inhabitants resulting in a vertical city. The 1,068 apartments of the first phase vary from 42m2 to 530m2 and are set to attract a diverse mix of population to the new neighborhood with the ambition of creating a lively sub-centre for Pune.

The studio to villa size apartments are designed according to an analysis of modern Indian housing standards. They are in general equipped with balconies, naturally ventilated service spaces and almost each bedroom has an individual bathroom. The hill shape structure with its peaks, valleys, canyons, bays, grottos and caves adds identity to the city and provides a large number of apartments with fine views and spacious balconies; its public space offers possibilities for interaction and communal activities. The 400 acres site is located 10 kilometers from the city centre of Pune in the centre of the Amanora Park Town development.

The first phase building is raised by a basement and plinth which contain parking and various public facilities: A school,

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 37

swimming pool, retail, bars, cafes and a cinema. At the tallest point of the structure a sky lounge will be established. The building follows a hexagonal grid to provide views and natural light to the apartments. This allows the 9 wings with double loaded corridors to be efficiently serviced by 4 cores. The interconnected courtyards are programmed to offer the inhabitants relaxing and social environments.

The facade will be made of concrete and the large windows will have sun protection by ornamented metal shutters, allowing for natural ventilation between facade and the many ventilation shafts that cross the structure vertically. The circulation spaces and public spaces will be clad in natural stone; the balconies are all clad in wood.

11. APPROVED PROPOSALS OF FUTURISTIC STRUCTURES Tianjin Eco-City The Sino-Singapore Tianjin Eco-city is the result of a collaborative agreement between the governments of China and Singapore to jointly develop a socially harmonious, environmentally friendly and resourceconserving city in China.

Designed to be practical, replicable and scalable, the Tianjin Eco-city will demonstrate the determination of both countries in tackling environmental protection, resource and energy conservation, and sustainable development, and serve as a model for sustainable development for other cities in China.

There is a set of 26 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for the Sino-Singapore Tianjin Ecocity. In formulating these KPIs, reference is made to national standards in China and Singapore, as well as international standards.

Some of the KPIs are listed below. The development of the start-up area and the entire Ecocity is targeted for completion by 2013 and 2020 respectively, and so reference is made to these years in the KPIs. Ambient Air Quality - The air quality in the Eco-city should meet at least China‘s National Ambient Air Quality Grade II Standard for at least 310 days.

Quality of Water from Taps - Water from all taps should be potable.

Carbon Emission Per Unit GDP - The carbon emission per unit GDP in the Eco-city should not exceed 150 tone-CS per US$1 million.

Proportion of Green Buildings - All buildings in the Eco-city should meet green building standards.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 38

Green Transportation - At least 90% of trips within the Eco-city should be in the form of green trips by 2020. Green trips refer to trips via non-motorized transport, i.e. cycling and walking, as well as trips on public transport.

Barrier-Free Accessibility - The Eco-city should have 100% barrier-free access.

Proportion of Affordable Public Housing - At least 20% of housing in the Eco-city will be in the form of subsidized public housing by 2013.

Usage of Renewable Energy - Renewable energy should account for at least 15% of the energy utilized in the Eco-city by 2020. Possible sources of renewable energy for the Ecocity include geothermal energy, hydropower and solar power.

Usage of Water from Non-Traditional Sources - At least 50% of the Eco-city‘s water supply will be from non-traditional sources such as desalination and recycled water by 2020.

Jobs to be generated in the Eco-city - Sufficient jobs should be generated for at least 50% of the Eco-city‘s residents within the Eco-city who are employable, to minimize the need for them to commute on a daily basis from their home to their workplace.

West 57th apartment building in Manhattan BIG has taken a step back to survey the rules of the system in Manhattan and is introducing a European typology: the perimeter block. With an efficient layout and a sense of intimacy, the perimeter block meets demands for density and security.

In this project, we have married it to the traditional Manhattan high-rise, creating a unique shape which combines the advantages of both: the compactness of a courtyard building with the airiness and the amazing views of a skyscraper.

The form of the building shifts depending on the viewer‘s vantage point. From the West Side Highway, it appears to be a pyramid; from West 58th, a dramatic glass spire. By keeping three corners of the block low and lifting the north-east portion of the building, the courtyard opens views towards the Hudson River and brings the low western sun deep into the block.

While the courtyard is a private space for residents, it can still be seen from the outside, creating a visual connection to the greenery of the Hudson River Park.

The slope of the building allows for a transition in scale between the low-rise structures to the south and the high-rise residential towers to the north and west of the site. The eye-catching

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 39

and highly visible roof consists of a simple ruled surface perforated with terraces—each one unique and south-facing. Its closed appearance is in contrast with the building‘s perimeter.

CPH Arch Copenhagen, Denmark A bridge spanning a body of deep water, providing the only dry connection between two stretches of land, is one of the most powerful architectural experiences in the landscape. Another classical element is the town gate, which marks the boundary between the countryside and the town, and ‗contains‘ the town, physically, structurally and aesthetically.

3XN‘s proposal for a construction on Marmormolen in Copenhagen is both: a town gate and a bridge that links Marmormolen with Langeliniekaj, creating a new coherent area in Copenhagen Harbor.

The towers and the bridge constitute one single, floating dynamic movement, characterized by the bold span across the harbor entrance in terms of both the plan design and the facade.

Establishing a connection across the harbor radically improves public access and creates brand new opportunities for life and growth in the area.

A bridge spanning a body of deep water, providing the only dry connection between two stretches of land, is one of the most powerful architectural experiences in the landscape. Another classical element is the town gate, which marks the boundary between the countryside and the town, and ‗contains‘ the town, physically, structurally and aesthetically. A city gate and a bridge that links Marmormolen with Langeliniekaj, creating a new coherent area in the Port of Copenhagen. The idea is to create a structure which brings together a complex urban situation in a distinctive and diverse development with the possibility of including flexible and efficient business areas. The towers, bridge and the other building elements constitute one single, floating dynamic movement, characterized by the bold span across the harbor entrance in terms of both the plan design and the facade. Establishing a connection across the harbor radically improves public access and creates brand new opportunities for life and growth in the area.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 40

12. FUTURE EARTH FROM STAR TREK SERIES Star Trek is an American science fiction/comic entertainment franchise created by Gene Roddenberry and currently under the ownership of CBS and Paramount. Star Trek‘s vision of the future is utopian by the very fact that Roddenberry wanted to show humanity had progressed and people had found a way of living together without killing each other.

12.1. Mega Structures Future Earth is stunning. It is sleek, shiny, and futuristic and a joy of building designs.

It is still London; it is just a billion times better. It is a sci-fi landscapers dream come to life.

The local architecture had a square and solid look, though the block like buildings were toppes with upswept gables perfectly balanced. The absolute symmetry dulled the spontaneity a bit but still found to be pleasantly whimsical. - Extract from Star trek:SCE:Out of the Cocoon by Kevin Killany

12.2. Physical Structure The architecture was balanced.

Whether it was air stucco and tile arches or solid timbers, every culture on globe was built with symmetry.

12.3. Conceptual Depiction For architecture, the best part about Star Trek: Into Darkness is undeniably the phantasmagoric depiction of a 23rd century San Francisco and London. Towering skyscrapers lined the horizon and flying vehicles weaved between them. It was all so beautiful.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 41

12.4. Transportation As the architecture is of the future city treads to be vertical, the designers strongly feel that the future mode of transportation will support the verticality at the same time the regular mode. The floor of a building, they don‘t have to come to the ground floor if one walks out of 80th to leave. This might leads us to the mid-way bridges and interconnecting roads.

12.5. Architecture of the Future: Skyscrapers as ornate as cathedrals and extensive multi-storied housing complexes with terraces and flower boxes spilling effusion of colors. Spidery bridges spanned gleaming rivers flowing between mossy banks, and connected some higher mountain peaks one to another, incorporating into the city plan. Silver cad figures could be seen traversing broad pedestrian walkways in centers of the bridges, even as all but silent transit pods housed in transparent tunnels shot by at speeds so quickly they were almost blur. Elevators flowed up and down effortlessly on the sides of buildings; automated multi level pedestrians walkways passed through open plazas as well as streets like narrow, deeply shaded canyons between taller buildings.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 42

12.6. Inference 1. Skyscrapers with extensive multi-storied housing complexes.

2. The concept of an elevated road.

3. Sustainable structures 4. Renaissance– touches with the past and present. The futuristic buildings raise along with the other structures that exists now there by the Renaissance.

5. Perfectly balanced.

6. The absolute symmetry 7. Automated multi level pedestrians.

8. Integrated systems 9. Multi level pedestrian‘s walkways passed through open plazas.

10. Harmony in all the systems.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 43

CONCLUSION

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 44

13. CONCLUSION 13.1. Architecture For Cinema - Cinema For Architecture If drawing is two-dimensional and architecture is three-dimensional, what kind of practice defines the fourth dimension? Many architects would say film, as it combines all the ideas of architecture — SPACE, physical dimension, light, sound, and materials — with time. Since the birth of the moving image, architects have explored how architecture can be present in film and how film can be expressed in architecture.

Architects have considered how their buildings have been cinematic as well — that is, the ways they can use cinema as their concepts to develop a structure sometimes those structures make spaces that feel like stages, encourage people to interact in dramatic ways, or offer specific surfaces for film or digital projections.

Image: A sketch by Mark Goerner Architecture articulates space, it also manipulates time. Architecture is not only about domesticating space, it is also a deep defense against the terror of time.

Re-structuring and articulating time - re-ordering, speeding up, slowing d own, halting and reversing - is equally essential in cinematic expression.

Lived space is not uniform, valueless space. One and the same event is an entirely different story depending on whether it takes place. An event obtains its particular meaning through the time of the day, illumination, weather and sound scape. In addition, every place has its history and symbolic connotations which merge into the incident. Presentation of a cinematic event is, thus, totally inseparable from the architecture of space, place and time, and a film director is bound to create architecture.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 45

There are hardly any films which do not include images of architecture. This statement holds true regardless of whether buildings are actually shown in the film or not, because already the framing of an image, or the definition of scale or illumination, implies the establishment of a distinct place. On the other hand, establishing a place is the fundamental task of architecture; the first task of architecture is to mark man‘s place in the world.

As Martin Heidegger expresses it, we are thrown into the world. Through architecture we transform our experience of out sidedness and estrangement into the positive feeling of domicile. The structuring of place, space, situation, scale, illumination, etc, characteristic to architecture - the framing of human existence - seeps unavoidably into every cinematic expression.

Cinema for Architecture Jean Nouvel, for instance, declares cinematic imagery and experience as a significant inspiration for his architectural work: Architecture exists, like cinema, in the dimension of time and movement. One conceives and reads a building in terms of sequences. To erect a building is to predict and seek effects of contrast and linkage through which one passes. In the continuous shot/sequence that a building is, the architect works with cuts and edits, framings and openings. I like to work with a depth of field, reading space in terms of its thickness, hence the superimposition of different screens, planes legible from obligatory joints of passage which are to be found in all my buildings .

Jean Nouvel is a French architect and theorist for whom architecture is not a formal question of aesthetically appealing buildings but a perceptual game of ephemeral optical effects. His work explores the possibility of turning the fixed, solid nature of architecture into an ever changing maelstrom of phenomenological illusions. He is a designer who seeks an architecture that is not based on presence, but one that is based on perception.

However, he is also a designer inspired by modern visual culture and in particular, film. Film revolutionised the way Nouvel saw the world. It gave him a new visual language, allowing him to better understand the way the eye works in everyday settings.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 46

Jean Nouvel Jean Nouvel (born 12 August 1945) is a French architect. Nouvel studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris and was a founding member of Mars 1976 and Syndicat de l'Architecture. He has obtained a number of prestigious distinctions over the course of his career, including the Aga Khan Award for Architecture (technically, the prize was awarded for the Institut du Monde Arabe which Nouvel designed), the Wolf Prize in Arts in 2005 and the Pritzker Prize in 2008.[A number of museums and architectural centers have presented retrospectives of his work.

This analyses one of Nouvel‘s most celebrated works, The Cartier Foundation building, from a joint phenomenological – cinematic perspective. It does so through the prism of two key figures in these respective fields: Maurice Merleau-Ponty from the world of philosophy and André Bazin from the arena of film. The aim of this essay is to highlight how this building encapsulates Nouvel‘s attempts to incorporate his understanding of film and phenomenology into architecture of intangible, ephemeral optical effects; an architecture that is both cinematic and phenomenological.

13.2. Do We Really Need Utopias?

Utopian ideas, or at least their spatial manifestations, seem to be getting easier to realize nowadays. The development of the Persian Gulf states, American urban sprawl, the European museum cities and China‘s urbanization all show that ―we do not merely want to dream - we want to live in dreams.” The temptation of the unknown, or rather the natural attraction towards change and evolution, has led visionary minds to construct ideal projections of future societies: paradises inhabited by man and governed by the laws of harmony and prosperity.

No-where places. Thereby, yes we do need utopias and also they are possible.

13.3. Influence of Utopian Visions from Cinema Film architecture and design has existed almost as long as cinema itself. Cinema escaped its primitive phase once it moved away from simple backdrops to threedimensional sets, thereby creating an architectural space within cinema.

We see the utopian concepts that resemble or sometimes are identical to designs seen and observed from existing structures.

Thereby, understanding that architecture and cinema are interdependent and interconnected where both learn from each other.

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 47

‘The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams’.

-Eleanor Roosevelt

13.4. Argument on Possibility of Such Visions: The futuristic buildings are not only visually arresting, they offer novel solutions to the challenges that lie ahead, such as harvesting water from clouds (as Dubai's vertigo-inducing, 2,716.5-feet-high Burj Khalifa does), creating high-rise rooftop forests, and offering perks like charging stations for electric cars.

Consider New Mexico‘s Spaceport America, a surreal Foster + Partners construction that will soon be the take-off point for Virgin Galactic‘s civilian space odysseys. Or Zaha Hadid‘s Galaxy Soho Building, a series of white domed structures connected by sky bridges that feels refreshingly fluid amid the imposing architecture that dominates Beijing. Other buildings that caught our eye are literally futuristic, with launch dates still a year (or a few) away. Yet projects like Abu Dhabi‘s Saadiyat Island Cultural District are already generating buzz. And that‘s part of the point, as cities jockey for influence in the 21st century and strive to appeal to both locals and visitors.

13.5. Scope of Architects in the Field: Interview with Marvel Editor Sana Amanat : According to Sana Amanat, MARVEL STUDIOS work under various categories and team like creative team, marketing team, and technology team and each such teams are further sub-divided into categories where in Architects and designers play a major role. There are Designers in the creative team and Solution Architects in the technology team.

These designers and architects imagine and build the environment of the comic, movies and games. These environments are used as a template for the rest of the works in progress. They are assigned to create and artist develops the template and uses it.

Courses offered for Architects and Designers: M. Arch - Masters in Visualization.

M.A. Architectural Visualisation M.Design- Animation/ Game and Film Design

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 48

REFERENCES: http://inhabitat.com/construction-commences-on-mvrdvs-massive-amanora-apartmentvertical-city-in-india/aerialmasterplan-copy/ https://archide.wordpress.com/2008/11/24/cph-arch-by-3xn-architects-in-copenhagendenmark/ http://www.arch2o.com/category/design/pavilion-architecture/page/3/ http://inhabitat.com/2014-china-flower-expo-pavilions-resemble-giant-floating-flowerpetals/china-flower-expo-labarchitecture-studio4-2/ http://www.arch2o.com/art-and-science-pavilion-lab-architects/ http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/modern-architecture-stunning?context=tagstructure http://www.pinterest.com/garvingarvin/architectual-utopia/ http://www.evolo.us/architecture/floating-pingtan-art-museum-by-mad-architects/ http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20130624-architecture-for-a-changing-world http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/11/bunge.php http://www.thecredits.org/2014/07/space-creators-building-guardians-of-the-galaxy/ http://thegrillogazette.blogspot.in/2011/05/architecture-of-santiago-calatrava.html http://www.lollipop.sg/content/did-you-know-planet-xandar-guardians-galaxy-based-spore http://www.dezeen.com/2013/01/29/worlds-largest-underwater-hotel-planned-for-dubai/ http://searchingforsustainability-planning.blogspot.in/2011/04/futuristic-eco-city-inchina.html http://www.designcommunit y.com/discussion/13826.html http://issuu.com/norvicastaneda/docs/francis_d.k_ching__ -_a_visual_dicti http://www.factoryfi fteen.com/7936/152393/home/megalomania http://www.de-ge.eu/writings/what -are-utopias-for http://content.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,2043872_2229124,00.html http://www.fosterandpartners.com/projects/7 -more-london-riverside/ http://marvelcinematicuniverse.wikia.com/wiki/Asgard http://www.darkknightnews.com/2014/04/arkham -knight-art-director-speaksgotham-cit y/ http://blog.visualmotive.com/2009/ten -examples-of-the-subway-mapmetaphor/

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 49

http://www.timelessmyths.com/norse/beginning.html#Home http://io9.com/5804054/thor -concept-art-includes-a-complete-map-of-asgard/ http://www.rancidrainb ow.com/freakshow/2013/06/15/around -town-in-asgard3/ http://www.rancidrainbow.com/freakshow/2013/06/09/around -town-in-asgard2/ http://www.rancidrainbow.com/freakshow/2013/06/04/around -town-in-asgard1/ http://m yriammahiques.blogspot.in/2012_11_01_archi ve.html http://dannybird22.tumblr.com/post/53144358224/helshades -asgardianarchitecture-now http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanesque_architecture http://www.akademeia.ca/index.php/main/article/viewArticle/ea0109 http://www.littlemissarchitect.com/2014/0 6/what-inspires-architects -jeannouvel.html http://sales.arte.tv/fiche/264/JEAN_NOUVEL http://www.yume.co.uk/architectural -representations -of-the-city-in-sciencefiction-cinema http://archive100.org/exhibits/beaut y-pageant/cinematic-space-architectureand-moving-image http://www.world -architects.com/pages/film/architecture -film http://www.archdail y.com/508576/six -miracle-materials-that-will-changetheir-industries http://www.pritzkerprize.com/2008/bio http://www.academia.edu/3258865/cinema_and_archit ecture

Analysis of Utopian Spaces from Comic Movies| 50

BIBLIOGRAPHY Cities and Cinema, Barbara Mennel The Disappearing City ( later republished as The Living Cit y) The Atlas of the DC Universe published in 1990 by Mayfair Games Inc. The Art of Batman Begins The Art of Thor The Dark Knight Manua l Comic book extract. Journey Into Mystery #85 (1962) Productions notes for Thor Asgard - The Planet of the Gods