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Notes -
One of the go-to locations when a horror movie wants to give you a sense of fear and eerieness is an old church in a traditional style. You see this in Resident Evil, Midnight Mass, in the architectural motifs of Harry Potter, etc. But when a movie wants to show alienation and social disunity and emotional coldness, they use brutalism. You see this in A Clockwork Orange, 1984, and the new Dune movie. Horror movies are unlikely to use brutalism to convey a sense of fear and people are unlikely to visit brutalism to feel a sense of awe. The Christian way to feel guilt is to look at the crucifixion and the way to feel fear is to look at the Last Judgment. Which architectural style is a suited home for the body of the God we killed, the spirit of the God that rose again, and the return of the God who raises the dead to life for an eternal judgment? I would say not brutalism, most concretely.
Some medications downregulate sensitivity to particular neurotransmitters in the hopes that doing so causes your body to upregulate production of said neurotransmitters. Similarly, it makes sense to me to try creating buildings that make people feel alienated in an effort to push them towards more community-minded behavior. I can't make any concrete statements about how well it works... but nevertheless, I miss the old St. Paul.
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I’m not sure if the placement of “brutalism” and “concrete” next to each other was intentional, but if so it’s quite clever.
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