I recently watched the movie Mute on Netflix, Duncan Jones’ sci-fi thriller set in a futuristic Berlin. The movie, which I liked, did itself no favour by using panoramic shots clearly inspired by Bladerunner, when the movie was in totally different vein, and most critics never saw beyond that comparison to Bladerunner and basically thrashed it (if you’re interested, here is a review that I actually agree with).
I was reminded of the movie when I put together this set of photos for the blog. Mute‘s panorama shots are so unlike Berlin, but its regular exterior scenes, a mix of actual footage and CGI, quite nail the city. Berlin isn’t, and will never be, a city like L.A. or New York or London, but it has its own cityline, a strange mix of the new and the old-ish, especially in the East part of Berlin, where the once-divided city’s socialist inheritance mixes, and clashes, with the shiny new capitalist present.
The photos I chose for this blog entry were, with one exception, taken in Alexanderplatz, which was the heart of former East Berlin, and you could even claim that it is the heart of all Berlin now. All photos were taken from places higher up, mixing a view of the streets below with the buildings above.
The photos were taken using Fujifilm cameras and the iPhone.