A cinematic reading of cities: reflection of identity or reproduction of chaos

In a world where urban perception is increasingly shaped by visual media narratives and lived memories, understanding contemporary cities can no longer be confined to purely morphological or functional analyses. Today’s urban experience is profoundly influenced by individual, collective, religious, and ethnic fragmentations. This paper, adopting an interdisciplinary approach at the intersection of architecture, urban studies, and film theory, proposes that cities can be read as living films. By employing cinematic concepts, a filmic reading of the city enables a critical and analytical perspective on spatial structure, identity representation, and the formation of urban narratives. The research framework draws on contemporary theories such as narrative urbanism, the urban spectator, and the mediated reading of space. These perspectives consider the city not merely as a physical or operational system, but as a multilayered narrative text—constantly rewritten by citizens, memories, and visual representations. Through the analysis of a key urban square in central Tehran, as a microcosm of Iranian urban space, the study reveals how fragmented editing, visual accumulation, memory erasure, and the dominance of advertising can produce a disjointed and chaotic urban narrative. Within such a context, the urban spectator is not merely a passive viewer but becomes a critic and re-narrator of space. This paper demonstrates how adopting a cinematic gaze toward the city can serve as a critical and intelligent tool for analyzing identity crises and opens up new ways of rethinking meaning, memory, and the lived experience of urban space.

کلیدواژه ها:

Identity ، Cinematic Perspective ، Narrative Disruption ، Urban Reading