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 Actor
Josh Pais documents the life and history of the stretch of Alphabet
City where he grew up and the eccentric mainstays of the neighborhood
who were eventually forced out by gentrification. Suffers from a
lack of structure, and a sense that we’re seeing only a couple
of the subjects change as the years progress, but the personal documentary
is certainly heartfelt. (1 hr. 12 mins.; NR) — BILGE EBIRI
Neighborhood Watch
"I thought there was something unusual about the people here,"
says 7th Street director Josh Pais, whose documentary profiles
six of his old East Village cronies. "If I didn't capture it,
it would be gone for good." Pais was raised off Avenue C, and
after a brief stint in Hollywood (his biggest gig was playing Raphael
in The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), he returned to his
block in 1992 and filmed what he saw over the next decade. "When
I was a kid, this is where the gangs fought," he says on Avenue
B, in front of a luxury-apartment complex. He remembers his friends
(an old street-fighting Jewish con man, a Native American artist
who once dated Pais's mom) as more vigorous and hopeful than they
appear in his film, where they seem mostly beaten by the usual urban
woes, then gentrification. "This neighborhood is always changing—that's
not a bad thing, but it does have an impact on people."
Opens January 17
• Showtimes
& tickets (movietickets.com)
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