I’ve never seen an episode of MTV’s The Hills and since I’m not 17, have no idea why it is popular but this little ditty comparing The Hills to the ouevre of Michelangelo Antonioni is too delightful to pass up.
4. Modern architecture as shorthand for moral emptyness/alienation. The Season 3 premiere was unlike most episodes of The Hills, in that it took place entirely outside of Los Angeles, but imagery of that city is so integral to what The Hills does that helicopter shots of the West Side as glittering grid make up the bulk of the opening credits and set the background for most promotional materials. An average episode makes ample use of establishing shots of LA buildings, which sometimes rival Audrina for screen time. Often we’ll see long montages of exteriors around where characters are meeting, and almost every episode ends with an image of LA represented by a shot of silverly skyscrapers blurring into the hazy blue sky. In representing congested Los Angeles as the “unnatural” environment that supports and breeds “shady” characters like Spencer and Heidi (as opposed to idyllic oceanside community Laguna Beach, glimpsed in the very beginning of the credit sequence to remind us from where Lauren was spawned), The Hills is maybe more dedicated to drawing an urban landscape as petri dish for ennui than anything since…
Antonioni film that this is JUST LIKE: …L’Eclisse, which comes to its own non-resolution (see Item 3) with a famed city montage.
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