Film Forum

(1981, Manfred Kirchheimer) Lyrical and contemplative this 45-minute wordless tone poem to elevated trains creaking by in northern Manhattan, the Bronx and upstate is set to ambient city soundscapes and the gutbucket gospel squall of Mingus and Aretha Franklin. Stations is not only stunning, but it's the first-ever film about graffiti, from “throw-ups” to “whole-cars” in gorgeous 16mm reversal, and is a meditation on the power of the image. Gorgeous. “A 45-minute proto-hip-hop bliss-out, a masterpiece of train- and tag-spotting.” –The Village Voice. DCP. Approx. 76 min.

Reviews

“The accidental magic of reflections and shadows meshes with the pure forms of architecture and the overlooked artistry of advertisements to conjure a feeling of unrelenting sensory adventure.”
– Richard Brody, The New Yorker

“Manfred Kirchheimer's Stations of the Elevated (1981) is a 45-minute proto-hip-hop bliss-out, a masterpiece of train- and tag-spotting dedicated to memorializing the extravagant graffiti on its era's MTA trains and how those trains rumbled across Brooklyn and the Bronx, bearing not just exhausted New Yorkers but gifted artists' urgent personal expression.”
– Alan Scherstuhl, The Village Voice

“Stations of the Elevated is about how beauty is discovered and made in unpromising circumstances.”
– A.O. Scott, The New York Times

“The Classic Graffiti Doc You Need to See.”
– David Fear, Rolling Stone