Directed by Frederick Wiseman
Runtime: 4 Hours and 32 Minutes
Unrated
Airing on PBS

by Ian Hrabe, Staff Writer

It’s one thing to put on a movie and realize you’re going to hate it, it’s another thing when that movie is four-and-a-half-hours long. Documentarian Frederick Wiseman has received what can only be described as unanimously glowing praise over the course of his long career, so I was excited to see what he was all about. What followed was one of the great cinematic endurance tests of my life. One where I tried to figure out who this movie–and Wiseman’s filmography in general–is for. I understand that there are indeed different strokes for different folks, but whose idea of a fun Friday night is turning on PBS and watching a FOUR-AND-A-HALF-HOUR documentary that is primarily composed of footage from the work meetings you dread going to. 

For those unaware of Frederick Wiseman’s style–present company included–his schtick is that of a fly on the wall. His debut, 1967’s Titicut Follies–which chronicles the patients at an institute for the criminally insane–is one every single “Best Documentaries of All Time” list you will find. Other subjects that Wiseman has given his objective observer treatment include high school, Central Park, the New York Public Library, the welfare system, a ballet company, the University of California at Berkeley, and the diverse Jackson Heights neighborhood of Queens. It’s sociology on film, and while his aim seems to be to shine a light on the overlooked aspects of our society, at least in the case of City Hall–which chronicles the day-to-day life of the work that goes on in Boston’s city hall building–he has done so in a way that no one would willingly sit through. Because City Hall is the most tedious film I have ever seen in my life. 

I tend to spiral when I watch a film that is universally acclaimed. I never suspect the film of being the one in the wrong, it’s always trying to figure out what is wrong with me that I don’t get why most people love a movie. It doesn’t happen too often. That’s not meant to be a humble brag or anything, but I’ve seen enough movies to at least get why something has appeal, even if it’s not for me. The most infuriating thing about City Hall is that there is a compelling film tucked within the film’s obscene running time, but without editing or context it’s more of a curiosity. Something you might see playing on a loop in an art gallery where you dip in for a couple minutes and dip out. 

AND YET. As the film wore on, I got into its rhythm. It felt a little like Stockholm Syndrome, or learning to appreciate your loquacious cellmate because you’re locked in the same room together and you need to make the best of it. While City Hall is as unconventional as it gets in terms of filmmaking (your municipality’s live streamed city hall meetings are likely just as interesting), there is a throughline that emerges. That comes in the form of Boston Mayor Marty Walsh. The film follows Walsh to various meetings around the city. You see him talking to the police, to the elderly, to veterans, to Latinos, to nurses, to the differently abled, and the way he is able to connect with each disparate group is the beating heart that you can hear under the layers and layers of tedium. It becomes clear why Walsh was recently tapped by the Biden Administration to be the Secretary of Labor. He’s a politician, absolutely, but he’s a politician who understands that his job is to serve. Though he uses a lot of platitudes, as the film wears on you see that his job is not to change everything, but to serve as the mouthpiece to the thousands of tendrils that make the city run. From social services to infrastructure, the thousands of people behind the scenes at city hall execute his agenda and he keeps his finger on the pulse of the city. 

The most compelling part of the film focuses on a meeting with local veteran’s, and Wiseman captures the story of two young men who served in Iraq. The camera never cuts, and it’s the one time in the movie where this works to the film’s advantage. The only other part of the film that inspired as much excitement was watching the city’s garbage men toss a discarded grill in the back of the garbage truck and seeing it get absolutely destroyed. What’s most frustrating is that, as noted earlier, there is a good film in here. I know that definition of “good” is entirely subjective, and that there is a crowd who will love this movie, but my main issue is that the filmmaking style does a disservice to the thankless work these civil servants are doing on a daily basis. 

There are plenty of mind-numbing meetings about the various social services the city offers that would be interesting if they were presented in one-minute chunks rather than 5-10 minutes of uncut footage. You can truly feel the boredom of the people sitting in the room. They talk and talk about programs you know nothing about and are given no context for. It feels like heresy to say that Wiseman’s filmmaking is unprincipled, and though it certainly feels like that I also understand that this is just his style. He seems to aim for pure neutrality, which is noble and interesting, but can anything be neutral when you have a camera pointed at it? You can see that some people are nervous, and you wonder if Mayor Walsh is covertly positioning himself as a democratic player by frequently bringing up “this current administration” and dragging Trump and the federal government’s failures. 

Granted, he’d probably say that stuff even if the cameras were off because one of City Hall’s buried treasures is how hard the Trump Administration has made it for local governments to run their cities. I just don’t know who this movie is for. If you’re collecting archival footage for a nuts and bolts look at how a major American city runs at the end of the 2010s, this is great, but if you are making a movie for people to watch so that they further understand this not so much. The 90 minute version is a fascinating mosaic of the behind the scenes work that makes a city run, the 272 minute version is the cure for insomnia.