Shining a light on the dark corners of Regent Park, Hot Docs film Invisible City takes us behind the walls of Toronto’s most notorious and controversial housing project
Invisible City – Hubert Davis
by Natasha N.

Using the Regent Park Social Housing project in Toronto’s downtown east side, as his starting point, Hubert Davis takes on the challenge of laying to bear the reality faced by the close knit community of residents here. The story follows two teenagers, Mikey and Kendal, through the latter part of their high school years. We learn of their difficulties at school, brushes with the law, and their aspirations to leave Regent Park through candid interviews with them, their mothers, and their role models. The cinematography shines – playing with extreme close ups and depth of field as a means to lure us in.

Never has a low-income housing project looked as beautiful as in Invisible City. Beautiful and expansive shots of the Regent Park Rejuvenation Project- currently underway, are woven throughout the character-driven doc. The subtly addressed glimmer of hope is what makes the story so poignant.

As his first feature length documentary, the film is a departure from his Academy Award Nominated short Hardwood. Whereas Hardwood gave viewers a chance to explore the emotions at play when Hubert was reunited with his estranged Globetrotting father, Invisible City lacks the emotional depth that Hardwood so successfully delivered.

At times the film feels like a list of events experienced by each character, rather than an emotional journey. Perhaps Davis shied away from the more challenging questions he could have asked Mikey and Kendall, or perhaps having followed Mikey and Kendall for three years, Davis was overwhelmed by the difficult of task of choosing what events to share with us. But the result is that we don’t get to know the boys as well we want to.