Shoppingtown

Short Australian film by David Caesar which creates a portrait of Parramatta Shoppingtown in August 1986. Initial blank screen isolates people’s words as they voice their aspirations and understanding of happiness. Silence follows as a series of film portraits reveal the inhabitants of Shoppingtown, a shopping centre in suburban Sydney. A rapid montage of images and sounds, most prominently the sounds of the checkout scanner, denote the commercial aspect of a space which has been established in the film as communal and civic. The portraits of shoppers and mall dwellers return, ending in a portrait of the filmmakers themselves.