Alice May Williams' 'Feverish Rumination on Progress'

Named for the unrealized amusement park proposed to replace the power station on the banks of the Thames, Dream City is "an experimental short that ruminates on the area’s past, present and future," per Adam D’Arpino's commentary at Psyche. "In a whirlwind monologue," the commentary continues, "a disembodied voice summons the dispassionate language of a mindfulness instructor whose words seem to encourage a woman peering out at the the power station to be present with her body and breath, and resist being drawn into 'past failures or future plans.'" The point of view, as seen in the screenshot above, invite viewers to imagine the project's outcome, all the while getting caught up in free-flowing thoughts expressed in the monologue.

The fast-paced dialogue, written by Williams and spoken by Jamey May, is very much a "feverish rumination on progress," echoed by the quick montages of archival footage, construction shots, and visualizations of the £9 billion project redeveloped by WilkinsonEyre. Just as "Williams channels the cynicism evoked by corporate promises of a techno-utopian future," once again in D'Arpino's words, Guardian architecture critic Oliver Wainwright, in an article from October — four decades after the plant was decommissioned, six years after the short film was made, and just shy of the project's public opening — finds that "every square inch [of the old power station] has been monetized." As such, Williams' film is as prescience as it is poetic.