The Lost City of Melbourne - Offical Trailer

In the 1850s, Melbourne was the fastest growing city in the world. “They dreamt big, they built big….it was a city jumping out of its skin”. It became an epicentre of film culture and its hotels, restaurants and cafes became world renowned. However, the attempted ‘modernisation’ of Melbourne in the 1950s destroyed much of the city, including its elegant cinemas and picture palaces. Our buildings were deemed too Victorian, the opposite of a modern metropolis, and Whelan The Wrecker’s demolition blitz began. Featuring rare archival film & photography, this film is a revelatory work that allows its audience to reimagine the former glory of the lost city of Melbourne.
More from Madman Films: www.madmanfilms...
Instagram: www.instagram.c...
Twitter: / madmanfilms
Facebook: / madmanfilms
Tiktok: / madmanfilms
Letterboxd: letterboxd.com...
Join our mailing list: www.madmanfilm...

[@andrewwilson9057]

grew up around Melbourne and never opened my eyes, just last weekend i took the kids in and actually walked around with the intension of being a tourist. It was lovely and some of the buildings are so lovely, Royal exhibition, state library, flinders st station, randomly i walked past 389 collins st and its probably my favourite building . Would have loved to see Melbourne in its prime. Will enjoy this movie

[@arthurwatts1680]

20 years later, Joh had the Deen brothers demolish heritage buildings in Brisbane in the dead of night so that his developer buddies could throw up hotels and office buildings that remained a blight on the skyline for decades. The greed in this country is gob smacking.

[@slipperyjoines6629]

Yes. I remember the Bellevue,Cloudland,others ? The were still demolishing places in the 2000's, next generation, probably still are. Doing dirty work. What a seedy lot, all of them

[@skrahzgutstomp5584]

That bloke was an absolute nasty piece of work.

[@arthurwatts1680]

@@skrahzgutstomp5584 I take it you mean Joh but it applies to most of his cronies.

[@skrahzgutstomp5584]

@@arthurwatts1680 yeah mate Joh

[@slipperyjoines6629]

@@skrahzgutstomp5584 I recall sweltering as he simply turned off the power to so many areas,due to ? the unions striking? Absolutely dictatorial, early version of what we've lived through since 2019.similar vein of specimen

[@v1e1r1g1e1]

City Developers: ''Oh... is that a beautiful old building? Yes...? Destroy it. Destroy it for no other reason other than it is ''old''

[@jabbersink6218]

Gotta say as an american whose lived in Australia for 14 years, been to every state except WA and SA, now living in Melbourne, theres no other place in Australia that feels like Melbourne...I love it more then New York. even if so many buildings are lost, Melbourne has a charm like nothing else. And ballarat nearby is like a European/Cali architectural wonderland. It's a playground for us artists and I'll cherish living here forever.

[@b.b.westonaus2699]

Great old buildings would still be standing strong today. You have too question why because it doesn't sound right to destroy history.

[@Rhodiac]

Globalism

[@voon1032]

@@Rhodiac chill out with the antisemitism bro.

[@Rhodiac]

@@voon1032 Im Jewish

[@HarperNguyen]

Capitalism.

[@sonofcirce]

so very grateful to live a walking distance to a beautiful locally run cinema. sun theatre you'll always have my heart

[@woodybalfour8213]

Great doco...highly recommend. i told all my friends to go.

[@JustBeYouooh]

I watched this full episode..they left out the The Progress Cinema in Coburg! It was in a side street for us residents

[@acetheprincep3658]

Made me physically sick to see those beautiful buildings being knocked down. Shameful thing.

[@snowyalice]

My proudest moment was seeing the short film I worked on being shown at the Astor, the same theatre where I’d see do many great films.

[@StarkIller-df7gw]

Really saddens me seeing what we lost! A friend had a store in a building that was an old theatre. And he told me one day have a look up the ceiling squares you know those ugly ones in offices yiu can simply push up. I climb up the ladder look up & the cwling was another 3 times of a normal 1 story ceiling & it was glorious. Full of amazing gold leaf paster work & frescoes you wouldn't believe. He sold it about 20years ago & it was renovated. Have no idea if it was saved. Its in Puckle Street Moonee Ponds old theatre where the billiards place was upstairs from the shops. Gorgeous building you couldn't tell though from street at they had modernised the dront for shops! We had these gorgeous theatres in every suburb. Buckley Street Footscray & Yarraville etc.

[@robert-brydson-1]

thankfully because they had so much to start with, even with the knocking down there is still an amazing amount left.

[@marenb.1414]

It's not just Melbourne. This happened all over Australia. Look up Tartarian Truthers - The Garden Palace in Sydney.

[@henrys4338]

That place burnt down

[@iamthezump]

Bruh not the conspiracy theories

[@klimmmers]

you're mad woman

[@christofthedead]

@@marenb.1414 if you had any level of media literacy you wouldn't have taken the time to look into it

[@middlecovemotors2474]

All built with horse and cart. First thing I thought.

[@DursunX]

i feel all cities store their character and soul within these stylish buildings. the facades are worth saving in the least.

[@shmick6079]

I attempted to have the Metro (aka the New Palace Theatre) saved via heritage protection, but Heritage Victoria didn’t agree that the building fit the criteria. Unbelievable, really.

[@b.b.westonaus2699]

Had some good times in the early 90's at the Palace and not that long ago I read the wrecking ball played the last song. I've got a soft spot for old building's being a carpenter and the destruction of grand old building's around Australia makes no sense such a waste. I'm starting to believe there is more to this than what we were taught and still repeated to this day about our early history in Australia. It's not unbelievable at all once you start looking into things and are open minded you'll start seeing the story just doesn't add up and then ask yourself why would these people lie too us? Because they don't care or to stupid to think for themselves or we have all been brainwashed from an early age to trust government. All about control...

[@StarkIller-df7gw]

Had so many fun times there as a youngster! Shame council wont save it!

[@andrewwilson9057]

also found it very impressive some of the building built in the 1850's with a population of less then 100,000

[@85ddrummer]

This looks like the most Melbourne documentary ever

[@kaizenonlinept9469]

looks very interesting

[@phoenixx5092]

Biggest cultural loss in my era was the loss of the Chevron complex, a super massive multistory nightclub and entertainment complex that was the cultural Australian gold standard for such things, just gone to build a pile of sh*t that nobody wanted, and in what they built to replace it, only f*ckwits rent space in. Then they built the absolute brutalist horror that politicians later seem to think was brilliant, the god awful waste of space known as federation square, that is universally hated by every red blooded Australian. On top of that next they built the street crime utopian disaster known as 'southern cross station' which takes up a pile of space, and somehow manages still not to actually do anything useful; except make it easier for people to beat up people and rob them with impunity. Next they decided to demolish the overhead railway lines, which on the surface seems like a good idea, but means we lost all of the unique and niche shopping nooks and spaces that used to exist in the support columns below it, for near 100 years and are now simply gone. About the only light at the end of the tunnel that isn't an oncoming train is that flinders still maintains (barely) its ballroom, and they keep trying to find excuses to destroy that, and hide the fact it still exists so when they do eventually ruin it, most people wont know what we lost. I also still recall the old exhibition centre, and one time museum, that is the only remaining example of crystal palace type artitecture in the world, and if it even still exists I know not what they use it for now. We lost so much.

[@janebaker4912]

Wow. 😮😮😮

[@jojosumit7690]

No beauty in the city these days. The design language of austerity brings us closer to the truth that these are elaborate open air prisons. Sterile white led streets strewn with careless snack refuse and nightly chunder. Ready for the hose down and roll call to do it all again. Ding Ding

[@dougieboxell6505]

Man those demolitions looked cool!! Hope theres more of them in this movie

[@lauriehartley9808]

There would be a lot fewer of our old buildings left in Melbourne today if not for Norm Gallagher and the BLF.

[@browsertab]

This is now happening in residential spaces as beautiful California bungalow style homes are knocked down for low rent cement apartments

[@HeretixAevum]

Whenever I watch anything to do with Melbourne's history, I'm always taken aback as to how the comment section is reliably a pocket of concentrated malice, bitterness and resentment. It really is something.

[@jackpubbo]

Melbornians wish Sydney on top!

[@delvin0965]

Melbourne is like a metaphor of the ship of Theseus.

[@MrProzacmilkshake]

can you use more easy words please i only been to public school

[@latenightlogic]

@@MrProzacmilkshakejust type it in on google. one could say that about any city though and I don’t particularly think narrm is an exceptional example of it.

[@christofthedead]

it's a physical city not a metaphor

[@krakajak67]

What is a meta for?

[@tjwest2605]

How old were they at the time of demolition? It seems like they took them down like they have been there for over a hundred years.(which is impssible) Not a few decades. Or less.

[@SpaTelliteAM]

You could even pay to see new at Paramount old silver screens. Escapism & a more peaceful society is lost!

[@1111manny]

Happened everywhere across the globe,war of the worlds ,only it was a invasion of our creative consciousness.

[@MikeD-hn9hf]

Nah, this'd make me too hopelessly angry to watch.

[@jasonmullinder]

and the builders now have the audacity leave plaques and commemorations naming indigenous tribes that inhabited the land before those original buddings were conceived of having a country established so close to the industrial revolution we can easily forget how little history we have compared to the rest of the world

[@MentalChappie]

Seemed to be a lot of orchestras back then 😂

[@Tracertme]

And now today Australia is just an American clone… architecturally 😢

[@planetdisco4821]

Bolte destroyed Collins st….

[@Jeremy-ho3vi]

W unite. Cos that's where it's going..

[@b.b.westonaus2699]

I don't think we have much time and most people are unaware of the troubles we all face!!

[@RcottR]

To be fair, we are probably doing it again with our 1960s and 1970s buids. I have to admit they are bloody ugly - but who knows, maybe in 30 years they may have some architectural value

[@spirosmanisalis3463]

Why stop at the 1960's? I'm sure there's a sequel ready made for production if you include what's happened up until the 2020's. Suggested title "Welcome to Hellbourne - A Neoliberal Experiment that Went Horribly Wrong"

[@juliedobson3039]

Thank god ROME didn’t have the same mentality 😂

[@hamishhunt555]

official* not offical

[@thereportoftheweek787]

They studied the fall off

[@johnflint7743]

They built it! Hahaha

[@middlecovemotors2474]

Tartaria much? All built with horse and cart.

[@b.b.westonaus2699]

What about those skilled convict's? The lies we all have been told.

[@Andy-o2f]

........and now it's a certified shithole. Thanks Casino and thanks Dan Andrews.

[@Kastistos2000]

Southbank was an industrial no man's land with factories and the casino opened it up.If u don't like our city then leave.😡

[@neilr4867]

Southbank was indeed a dump before the casino. But unfortunately Southbank and the casino (along with the rest of the city) are again a dump thanks to mismanagement, neglect and poor laws.

[@divideandmultiply]

What did Dan Andrews have to do with this? Damn you cookers are ridiculous.

[@Marc-io8qm]

@@divideandmultiplyif you can’t see the damage that man caused to your city, and just resort to that corporate Newspeak then we can’t help you. If you aren’t seeing the damage the jabs have done then go back to watching the tube.

[@divideandmultiply]

@@Marc-io8qm "the jabs", ok you lunatic.

[@Sirpslog]

Lackadaisy ass trailer

[@RadagastTheBrwn]

We are still very much suffering from cultural cringe unfortunately

[@supermaticboy]

Even now, Melbourne looks horrible... waste everywhere and don't forget the needles...

[@jxmai7687]

Don't worry, after another 100 years later, everything will change again, and we will be long gone.

[@supermaticboy]

@@jxmai7687 I wish 😬

[@KellBC1]

Because CHINA

[@sloppingfish946]

this looks really boring, im definitely not watching this

[@mickythefish4535]

Now it's just a socialist sewer.

[@jonathonlivingstonelemming1024]

All this pales into insignificance compared to what Andrews did to the joint. It's totally unrecognisable.

[@kashiichan]

* eyeroll *

[@christofthedead]

oh noes they knocked down the gender segregation dining rooms how will misogyny ever recover

[@evansutcliffe1099]

destroy historical landmarks, a bad thing may have happened there once hundreds of years ago!!

[@EmileFeik]

we live on stolen land. Nowhere is clean

[@mikespearwood3914]

Do we destroy everything from the past that might be deemed "controversial" today?!

[@georgegeorgenstein]

what is this soundtrack man. nah

[@markdowse3572]

GOLD was the source and the reason for all this AMAZING STUFF in Melbourne. I have visited Melbourne many, many times. Never seen any of it. Now I know why. SYDNEY IS WORSE. We Sydneysiders have almost nothing remaining... M 🦘🏏😎 1st

[@b.b.westonaus2699]

That's the story you've been told to believe.