The film shows at regular speed the operation of machines packaging food. The sun rises over the city and we see people hurrying to work. The next shots are closer shots of cars on a highway. This is followed by an extreme time-lapse close-up of the moon passing behind a skyscraper. The first shots are traffic patterns as seen from skyscrapers at night. The events captured in this sequence involve people interacting with modern technology. The sequence uses time-lapse photography of the activity of modern life. The next sequence begins with shots of buildings and a shot of a sunset reflected in the glass of a skyscraper. A time-lapse shot of a crowd of people who appear to be waiting in a line is followed by shots of people walking along streets in slow motion. The sequence ends with footage of the destruction of large buildings. Time-lapse photography of shadows of clouds are seen moving across the skyscrapers, followed by shots of various housing projects in disrepair, including footage of the decay and demolition of the Pruitt-Igoe housing project in St. This is followed with stock footage of Soviet tanks lined up in rows and a military aircraft, and an aircraft carrier. Shots of taxiing United Boeing 747 aircraft and traffic patterns during rush hour on a freeway are followed by a shot of a large parking lot. Following the atomic bomb detonations, the next sequence begins with a shot of sunbathers on a beach, then pans to the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in the background. Humankind's continued involvement in the environment is depicted through images of mining operations, oil fields, the Navajo Generating Station, the Glen Canyon Dam, and atomic bomb detonations in a desert.

This is followed by shots of power lines in the desert.

After aerial views of monumental rock formations partly drowned by the artificial Lake Powell, we see a large mining truck causing billows of black dust.

The film's introduction to human involvement in the environment is a low aerial shot of choppy water, cutting to a similar shot of rows of cultivated flowers. From there, it progresses to footage of various natural phenomena such as waves and clouds. The film fades into a shot of a desolate desert landscape. The next image is a close-up of a Saturn V rocket during its launch ( Apollo 11). The section shown depicts several tall, shadowed figures standing near a taller figure adorned with a crown. The first image in the film is of the Great Gallery pictograph in Horseshoe Canyon, in Canyonlands National Park, Utah. In 2000, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being 'culturally, aesthetically, or historically significant'. However, because of copyright issues, the film was out of print for most of the 1990s. Koyaanisqatsi is the best known of the trilogy and is considered a cult film.

The trilogy depicts different aspects of the relationship between humans, nature and technology. The film is the first in the Qatsi film trilogy: it is succeeded by Powaqqatsi (1988) and Naqoyqatsi (2002). It no longer describes the world in which we live.' In the Hopi language, the word Koyaanisqatsi means 'life out of balance'. It's because, from my point of view, our language is in a state of vast humiliation. Reggio explained the lack of dialogue by stating 'it's not for lack of love of the language that these films have no words. The visual tone poem contains neither dialogue nor a vocalized narration: its tone is set by the juxtaposition of images and music. The film consists primarily of slow motion and time-lapse footage of cities and many natural landscapes across the United States. Koyaanisqatsi ( English: / k oКЉ ЛЊ j Й‘Лђ n ЙЄ s Л€ k Й‘Лђ t s iЛђ/ ), also known as Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance, is a 1982 American experimental non-narrative film produced and directed by Godfrey Reggio with music composed by Philip Glass and cinematography by Ron Fricke. Grand Central Terminal in New York City is shown several times in the film.

Pieces 1982 dvd chapters