Utopia London

Utopia London is a 2010 documentary directed by Tom Cordell, in which he explores the modernist dreams and relics of the the city, and tries to explain how they came to be.

He covers the stories of some of our most brilliant places: Alton East and West; Finsbury Health Centre; Dawson's Heights; Alexandra Road; Lambeth Towers; the South Bank. And he does it with such style. There are revelatory and delightful interviews with Neave Brown, Kate Macintosh, John Bancroft and George Finch. There are beautifully framed and expressive shots of the buildings and the people who live and work in them. There's a soulful narration too, provided by Tom, who rarely intrudes but occasionally adds a tone of awed wonder and melancholy to the narrative.

I watched this fairly recently on DVD, even though I bought it ages ago. I knew it was going to be good, and I was nervous about Concretopia at the time, so I couldn't bring myself to watch something that was probably going to turn out to be much better than my book. I'm glad I finally got round to it. Utopia London really is something special: a documentary any of us who are interested in postwar architecture, planning and design should see.

I was sad not to have seen it on a big screen when it was released in 2010, and disappointed too not to have seen it turn up on TV. But the DVD can be bought from their wonderfully informative website, and I can't recommend it highly enough. It has soul and heart and beauty – which may indeed be why it hasn't had a wider release.