The History of Concrete

After ending his HBO series after three seasons, John Wilson struggles to convince backers that he has a viable feature film with "The History of Concrete."

Laura's Review: B+

"The History of Concrete" exhibits the same sense of humor and coloring far outside the lines of his purported subject as 'How to with John Wilson,' the series he thought had run its course. Wilson has a talent for pairing quirky visuals from his beloved New York City with an oral narrative they often have little to do with, something akin to audio visual puns. With a writers' strike ongoing and his royalty checks shrinking, Wilson notes that the only class offered by the WGA was 'How to write a Hallmark movie,' a class he attends looking for some kind of inspiration (which may explain his overlong segue into a local musician's love life, a sidestep which throws off his third act pacing). He's also dealing with the maintenance issues in the building he bought from his landlady in the fifth episode of Season 2, a friend's basement apartment frequently flooding and somehow both of these things will funnel right back into his theme.

After explaining the difference between cement and concrete, the former an element of the latter, Wilson takes a trip to Rome and visits the Pantheon, whose round, unreinforced concrete dome still stands two thousand years later, Wilson's most sincere stab at concrete's historical significance (befuddled guards, thinking he's pointing at the building's columns, keep responding 'marble'). He'll also visit the oldest street in the country, made of concrete and located in Ohio, noting its disrepair, yet ends up at a company that preserves the tattoo art of dead loved ones. A trip to Hallmark's soundstages, ironically housed in a concrete bunker, unveils a dramatically depressing work environment but reinforces their formulaic approach to filmmaking.

With one exception, though, Wilson's film is best when he sticks to the streets of New York City, cataloging the various ways humankind chooses to make its mark on freshly poured sidewalks. In Bed-Sty, locals even created an aquarium within a sidewalk complete with goldfish, until the city filled it in, a joyless bit of municipal bureaucracy. We learn that the man who runs Gum Busters, an actual chewing gum removal business, has bottles of wine with Gum Busters labels made up for his clients at Christmas ('it's actually good wine,' he tells Wilson). Showcasing a 3,100 mile foot race that takes place on a block in Queens over the course of 52 days, Wilson notes the absurdity of an unemployed individual spending two months walking around a high school while a woman who didn't complete the race suggests its concrete surface isn't ideal.

Then there's the Las Vegas concrete convention, one whose bricklaying competition is kicked off by a Navy color guard and the national anthem and whose conventioneers include a 'Women of Concrete' subgroup. From his own attempts at patching his foundation to a 3D printed concrete Starbucks to the stars' handprints at Grauman's Chinese Theater, Wilson has essentially delivered a super-sized episode of 'How To,' artfully written and assembled (editor Cori Wapnowska. 'How to with John Wilson') so that one seemingly unrelated topic flows into the next. Wilson has carved out his own documentary subgenre, one which pairs the personal with the preposterous.

Robin's Review: B-

Debut feature film maker John Wilson (from HBO's "How to with John Wilson") uses his signature style to tell his stories. He turns to the second most used element on earth and informs us of, among other things, "The History of Concrete."

I was unfamiliar with John Wilson's scattershot approach to filmmaking so, after watching "History," I watched an episode of his HBO show. First off, this style is not my cup of tea but, here, it allows the filmmaker to explore more about human nature.

Sure, it is called "The History of Concrete" and Wilson does get to that eventually. First, though, he tells about his creative block and how he took a class, "How to Make a Hallmark Movie." I do not know if you have ever dabbled in watching the Hallmark Channel but I did, just to see, and they have all the same components, just realigned slightly from one HM film to the next. They may not be very good but they are romantic – at least for someone.

Wilson, among other things, presents us with a sidewalks-of-the-city montage of  New Yorkers' behavior, a gum removal business (Gum Busters), a collection of tattoos on pieces of human flesh – did you know that Charlie Manson' forehead swastika is the most valuable? – and a protest against affordable senior housing.

Then, he begins his analysis on concrete and all that it is, telling us the substance is the most used commodity on earth, after water. We learn all about concrete, its production, its vast use for important things like the small concrete monument in Ohio marking the "shortest highest point in the country" and the oldest concrete street in the country, 1891. We also learn that the Pantheon in Rome is the oldest unreinforced concrete dome in the world – them Romans made better concrete than we do.

We get to pay a visit to the National Concrete Masonry Association conference and learn even more about concrete and the biz – and its controversies, like Tony Hawke wanting to pave over – with concrete – a lovely wooded park for a skateboard facility. You will learn more about concrete than you ever though you would.

John Wilson, though, is not satisfied with giving us an informative documentary about concrete and all its uses. At about the three-quarters mark, he introduces us to his friend, Jack, an out of work musician who shills booze at liquor store displays. Needless to say, but I will anyway, this shift in gears and story line essentially brings the film to a halt, The shift may make sense to Wilson but not to me.

If that last change of gears was omitted, Wilson's debut feature would have been far better. Instead, it deflates like a tire with a not-so-slow leak.

Magnolia Pictures releases "The History of Concrete" in select theaters on 9/18/26, expanding in subsequent weeks.