Mudflats Living
1972 · 28m · Canada
Directed by Robert Fresco, Kris Paterson
Genres: documentary
Tones: contemplative, provocative
Squatters building an artistic, anti-establishment community on North Vancouver's mudflats defend their way of life against a mayor who wants to replace their homes with a shopping centre.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
A 1972 doc that treats squatter anarchists as the rational ones and the mayor as the cartoon villain—the kind of inversion most scouts would hedge with 'both sides' hand-wringing, but Fresco and Paterson commit to it completely. That's the contrarian move that actually earns itself.
Situated squarely in the structural documentary tradition of Wiseman and the Canadian direct cinema lineage, this film's restraint—letting conflict breathe through observation rather than intervention—feels increasingly rare and formally rigorous by comparison to its peers.
The decision to let the mudflat residents speak for themselves without voiceover or scored manipulation does the heavy lifting; in 1972, that was a choice, and it's what makes the counterculture feel lived-in rather than romanticized.