‘The History of Concrete’ Review: John Wilson on Permanence

Since his HBO sequence The best way to with John Wilson got here to an finish in 2023 after three seasons, John Wilson has felt directionless. Struggling to safe financing for his newest mission, he attends a WGA seminar on writing Hallmark films, whose income streams appear uniquely unaffected by latest business turmoil. In a roundabout method, the seminar’s tips, which emphasize escapism, business enchantment, and optimism, function the inspiration for Wilson’s humorous and expectedly poignant characteristic directorial debut, The History of Concrete, which defines itself in opposition to Hallmark’s, effectively, hallmarks.

As Wilson intersperses narrated musings on concrete with frequent Zoom calls pitching this documentary topic to dumbstruck brokers and producers, the documentary reveals itself as a chronicle of its personal making. Functionally, The History of Concrete operates like a feature-length episode of Wilson’s HBO sequence. Absurd B-roll captured round New York Metropolis includes the majority of the movie’s imagery, strung collectively by the filmmaker’s narration, his anthropological observations brimming along with his signature dry wit. However the 101-minute working time affords Wilson new formal alternatives, even inside a well-recognized framework.

Whereas Wilson’s strategy has at all times concerned veering off on detours from his central thesis, often upon assembly some eccentric particular person and falling down a rabbit gap alongside them, right here he’s in a position to revisit separate ongoing threads, similar to a 52-day marathon spanning 3,100 miles on concrete, or the musical aspirations of an area liquor retailer pattern attendant. Whereas a lot of Wilson’s work can hardly be stated to have even a semblance of plot, it’s simple to acknowledge A, B, and C plots throughout the extra expository discussions right here on metropolis planning and mortality.

On this regard, The History of Concrete begins to structurally mimic the shape of concrete itself. As we’re knowledgeable by manufacturing facility employees, the distinction between cement and concrete is that the previous is a particular materials, whereas the latter is a combination of cement and varied different supplies and objects. This renders concrete a much less bolstered materials than pure cement, and as many concrete employees comment all through the movie, it’s solely rising weaker.

At one level within the movie, Wilson observes {that a} split-open piece of concrete, with rocks strewn concerning the inside of a cement filling, resembles a fruitcake. One can’t assist however have a look at The History of Concrete, basically a system of non sequitur, as Wilson’s personal fruitcake of types. And half of his journey, as he interviews people and witnesses comical eventualities whereas journeying throughout New York Metropolis, is coming to phrases with the fragility of that construction.

Whereas a lot of The History of Concrete’s leisure worth comes from Wilson’s deadpan humor as he tries to persuade individuals {that a} movie about concrete is even value making, he’s dead-serious when he factors out that the structural integrity of concrete is being challenged by the day. New York Metropolis, for one, is dealing with rising flooding points resulting from crumbling concrete foundations. There’s additionally the matter of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, the place the metal mesh sheets getting used to carry crumbling concrete in place have gotten more and more unstable.

Wilson hyperlinks his anxieties round growing older infrastructure to these across the longevity of his profession. Clearly, he feels a scarcity of construction in his personal life, having anticipated The best way to with John Wilson to be a extra everlasting fixture than it turned out to be, each commercially and culturally. With royalty checks from HBO dwindling and a place in common tradition he’s not fairly certain learn how to sq. (on the one hand, he’s common sufficient for use to advertise Ridgewood-themed weed strains, however on the opposite, somebody confuses him for Ari Aster), one can really feel, as he describes the best way concrete is deteriorating, that Wilson is reckoning with the impermanence of artwork.

One of Wilson’s preoccupations is the Buddhist ritual of sand mandalas the place monks spend days creating intricate designs out of sand, solely to destroy them as quickly as they’re accomplished. The odd and poignant The History of Concrete, then, may very well be seen as a present of Buddhist acceptance of artwork’s—and by extension life’s—transience. The best way Wilson sees it, as extra than simply his beloved metropolis is on the brink of collapse, permanence in artwork is incompatible with actuality.