''The Parking Lot Movie'' is an American

documentary film A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...

directed by Meghan Eckman. It was filmed from 2007 to 2010 and premiered at the

South By Southwest South by Southwest (SXSW) is an annual conglomeration of parallel film, interactive media, and music festivals and Convention (meeting), conferences organized jointly that take place in mid-March in Austin, Texas. It began in 1987 and has conti ...

film festival in

Austin, Texas Austin ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Texas. It is the county seat and most populous city of Travis County, Texas, Travis County, with portions extending into Hays County, Texas, Hays and W ...

in 2010. It was purchased by

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...

and aired nationwide on ''

Independent Lens ''Independent Lens'' is a weekly television series airing on PBS featuring documentary films made by independent filmmakers. Past seasons of ''Independent Lens'' were hosted by Angela Bassett, Don Cheadle, Susan Sarandon, Edie Falco, Terrenc ...

'' October 19, 2010, opening the series' 2010 season.

Synopsis

''The Parking Lot Movie'' follows a group of parking lot attendants who work at The Corner Parking Lot in

Charlottesville, Virginia Charlottesville, colloquially known as C'ville, is an independent city (United States), independent city in Virginia, United States. It is the county seat, seat of government of Albemarle County, Virginia, Albemarle County, which surrounds the ...

. They have to deal with drunken, rude, and cheap patrons, as well as vandals. The film centers on the experience of the attendants, who are primarily students at the nearby

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States. It was founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson and contains his The Lawn, Academical Village, a World H ...

, and mostly majoring in

Liberal Arts Liberal arts education () is a traditional academic course in Western higher education. ''Liberal arts'' takes the term ''skill, art'' in the sense of a learned skill rather than specifically the fine arts. ''Liberal arts education'' can refe ...

subjects such as

Philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

Anthropology Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, society, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including archaic humans. Social anthropology studies patterns of behav ...

. The result is that they are given the opportunity, while working at the Corner Parking lot, to examine aspects of the

human condition The human condition can be defined as the characteristics and key events of human life, including birth, learning, emotion, aspiration, reason, morality, conflict, and death. This is a very broad topic that has been and continues to be pondered ...

in terms of

societal norms A social norm is a shared standard of acceptable behavior by a group. Social norms can both be informal understandings that govern the behavior of members of a society, as well as be codified into rules and laws. Social normative influences or s ...

and

values In ethics and social sciences, value denotes the degree of importance of some thing or action, with the aim of determining which actions are best to do or what way is best to live ( normative ethics), or to describe the significance of different a ...

, as well as to refine their own personal philosophy of life. In the words of John Lindaman, one of the attendants who had worked there for 11 years: "It taught me how to be a human being." It is this aspect of the film that sets it apart from other documentaries.

Production

Director Meghan Eckman and assistant director Christopher Hlad filmed ''The Parking Lot Movie'' over a three-year period, from 2007 to 2010, predominantly in and around the Corner Parking Lot in

. The crew interviewed at least 21 people associated with the parking lot, including owner Chris Farina, current attendants, and former attendants. For the soundtrack, Eckman hired New York-based musician Sam Retzer, who had spent several years as a student in Charlottesville. Other songs on the soundtrack are written and performed by former parking lot attendants featured in the movie, including Mark Schottinger and John Lindaman.

Film festivals

* South by Southwest Film Festival, Austin TX 2010 *

Independent Film Festival of Boston The Independent Film Festival Boston is a not for profit film festival in Boston, Massachusetts. History The Independent Film Festival Boston (also known as IFFBoston or IFFB) was created in 2003 by the non-profit organization the Independent F ...

MA 2010 *

Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival The Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival is the largest documentary festival in North America. The event takes place annually in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The 27th edition of the festival took place online throughout May and Jun ...

, Toronto 2010

Reception

The film was generally well-received. Neil Genzlinger, reviewing the film for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', compared watching it to actually working at a parking lot, in that "there are long stretches when not much happens, but every once in a while there’s a burst of activity that is kind of enthralling." In particular, he praised the occasional moments when "the ilm'smix of absurdism and intellectualism is perfect."

References

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External links