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Not true at all. Well, it really depends on the area. Where i was there (Garment District, Fashion district, Toy District..etc) It was Packed! It was hard to get through the crowd of people.
People really underrate the Downtown LA area imo.
Oh, thanks for clearing that up. I really thought Downtown LA was dead.
I thought Downtown LA wasn't vibrant. (According to what I've heard from the people that live in LA)
It's always been vibrant, but not very upscale. The area needs work there. It also lacked nightlife, although that's changed now, quite dramatically. It's also a lot bigger than people think.
Haven't spent much time in Houston, so I can't speak to the overall vibrancy of it. I don't think Houston and LA are that similar either.
I think Denver is very close, unfortunately a lot of their historic buildings have been demolished, but compare this: los angeles, ca - Google Maps with this: http://g.co/maps/9z36c (oops.)
Same medium density mixed use. They actually look almost identical to me, other than I think there is more ground floor retail at the LA intersection.
Last edited by munchitup; 01-16-2012 at 04:02 PM..
Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
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Quote:
Originally Posted by nslander
Interesting you don’t readily associate noir with Los Angeles. I guess that literary and film history gets washed out by the celebrity culture spotlight. Living here, it’s the other way around.
I guess I associate the 'noir' genre with old cities with narrow cobblestone streets, townhouses, that sort of thing. Paris, London, New York, Philadelphia. 'Cities of the night.' LA seems too sunny and modern on the surface. I do think a lot of that genre was set around LA simply because of the film industry and the intrigue of it.
I guess I associate the 'noir' genre with old cities with narrow cobblestone streets, townhouses, that sort of thing. Paris, London, New York, Philadelphia. 'Cities of the night.' LA seems too sunny and modern on the surface. I do think a lot of that genre was set around LA simply because of the film industry and the intrigue of it.
I get what you’re saying, at least with regard to film. But the works of Chandler, Cain, West, Fante, Bukowski, Didion, Mosley, MacDonald, Connelly, Ellroy et al. are so associated with Los Angeles, I don’t know how they ever become uncoupled in the popular consciousness.
I get what you’re saying, at least with regard to film. But the works of Chandler, Cain, West, Fante, Bukowski, Didion, Mosley, MacDonald, Connelly, Ellroy et al. are so associated with Los Angeles, I don’t know how they ever become uncoupled in the popular consciousness.
Yes, and add to your literary list the music of The Doors, X, Black Flag, NWA, and Guns N Roses. Not necessarily noir but there has long been a dark, seedy underbelly reflected in the city's homegrown popular music.
Downtown LA is a lot busier than many people realize, and it's only getting better. I always see lots of comparisons to Houston, but I don't see it except for when viewing the main downtown skyline from afar. At street level they're very different. Houston doesn't have as large a stock of old office and apartment buildings in it's downtown area, I'm pretty sure it doesn't have anywhere that's nearly as consistently crowded/vibrant as much of LA's old historic core is, and it seems to have less connectivity between downtown and the surrounding neighborhoods.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Trimac20
I guess I associate the 'noir' genre with old cities with narrow cobblestone streets, townhouses, that sort of thing. Paris, London, New York, Philadelphia. 'Cities of the night.' LA seems too sunny and modern on the surface. I do think a lot of that genre was set around LA simply because of the film industry and the intrigue of it.
All this talk of film noir, and no mention at all of San Francisco? One of the earliest and most famous film noirs, The Maltese Falcon, was filmed in SF. It was a very prominent city in film noir, with the following films as far as I know taking place there, either completely or partially (yeah I'm kind of a Film Noir fan): the Maltese Falcon, Vertigo, The Lady From Shanghai, Dead On Arrival, Impact, Point Blank, Out of The Past, The House on Telegraph Hill, The Woman on Pier 13, House of Numbers, Escape in the Fog, The Raging Tide.
I would go so far as to say that after LA and NYC, SF was one of the most common film noir settings.
...but of course LA was the biggest filming locale for Noir (or any type of film), seeing as Hollywood is located there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SalParadise
Not necessarily noir but there has long been a dark, seedy underbelly reflected in the city's homegrown popular music.
You can say that about tons of cities. Every city has their homegrown gangster rappers like NWA, as well as other types of music that deal with "dark" subject matter. Hip Hop itself came from NYC. Seattle spawned grunge, The Bay Area and LA both gave rise to thrash metal, and The Bay, LA and NYC all played a big part in the development of Punk rock. What about the blues? That's often some dark, "seedy" and depressing music as well, and has roots all over the south. You also mentioned the Doors and Guns N Roses, but psychedelic and hard/classic rock are also far from being unique to LA.
The reason I picked Phoenix was not because they mirror each other, just google any downtown (insert city) streets and the one that resembled LA the most was Phoenix with Denver coming in second, when I did the same with Houston all I got was streets with office buildings/skyscrapers which is not what what I think of when thinking of DTLA, I mean of course DTLA has office buildings but that's not the part of downtown that is full of life, from afar Houston does resemble LA, but from a street POV it would be a mix of Phoenix and Denver.
Maybe that's what it looks like in photos and on streetview, but not in person. At least not to me. The mix of buildings looks completely different. Plus Phoenix is so much smaller that it's hard to even compare. It might be one of the downtown's that is least like downtown Los Angeles. Denver doesn't remind me of LA either. Not anymore than Atlanta, Pittsburgh, or any other random place.
I think that Dallas is much more like LA than Phoenix. And from what others have said, maybe Houston. Haven't been there to know for sure.
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