Olmsted and America's Urban Parks

Visits to three animal parks in Miami, Florida: the Rare Bird Farm, with it's many chickens, cranes, and other birds; the Monkey Jungle, where the visitors are caged and the simian inhabitants roam freely; and finally the Parrot Jungle.

André Le Notre is certainly the most famous French gardener. He was also a designer, architect, engineer, landscaper and urban planner. He worked for Louis XIV from 1645 to 1700 and designed the gardens of Versailles, Vaux le Vicomte, Chantilly and Fontainebleau, as well as the Tuileries in Paris.

Isamu Noguchi was a sculptor, designer, architect, and craftsman. Throughout his life he struggled to see, alter, and recreate his natural surroundings. His gardens and fountains were transformations meant to bring out the beauty their locations had always possessed.

Reclaiming what was once stolen from him, a man journeys back to the place of his childhood nearly 80 years after his world came crashing down.

Documentary about the social microcosm of Hasenheide, a 50 hectar green area in Berlin, located between Kreuzberg and Neukölln. In this park, you'll find old women with their dogs, young football players, Turks at the barbecue, as well as nudists. For the residents, Hasenheide is sports area, living room, pub and runway all at once. A refutation of the media panic surrounding the park as a place of drug dealing and violence.

Bournemouth offers a variety of sports, pastimes, steamer trips, and fine dining for holidaymakers, competing with cheaper foreign holidays and offering a variety of transportation options.

To Olmsted, a park was both a work of art and a necessity for urban life. Olmsted’s efforts to preserve nature created an “environmental ethic” decades before the environmental movement became a force in American politics. With gorgeous cinematography, and compelling commentary this film presents the biography of a man whose parks and preservation are an essential part of American life.

This short documentary profiles the idyllic landscapes of Parc Lafontaine. Set to an original song, the film follows a mother who brings her son to the park, where he plays, swings, and watches the ducks and gondolas glide on the pond. As an adult, he wanders through the park with his sweetheart. The song closes sadly, for his sweetheart leaves him. The passing gondola seems to bear his love away forever, but the final scenes suggest a happy ending. - NFB

The British invented them for the world, and they have been described as 'the lungs of the city - historian Dan Cruickshank reveals the history of our public parks.

A group of children are encouraged to play in a park by two men. Some play a skipping game. One of the other children refuses and eventually runs away. Another child is fascinated by the camera and stares at it throughout, even when encouraged by one of the men to play. IN the background, traffic passes and pedestrians stroll past behind a railing on an upper level. The children wear sunhats, indicating the weather is very sunny.