Documentary Educational Resources - Subject / Urban & Rural Studies / Gentrification / All Films

Down the Project

Thu, 30 Aug 2018 07:05:00 GMT

Sixty years ago, the "projects" were considered to be the most desirable housing stock for low-to-low-middle-income Americans. Today, this same housing has become stigmatized, beset by financial and social problems, and may be phased out.

This film, made in the 1980s, remains the classic portrait of a government program besieged on all sides. In two 30-minute sections, the film presents a concise social history of a housing movement and its opponents, then examines the social dilemmas of the developments these forces produced. Spokespeople include residents, public housing advocates from the 1930s, developers, administrators and politicians.

Down The Project: The Crisis of Public Housing presents the story of two projects that housed working families, both white and black, in the 1940s. In later years, crippled by lower budgets and the needs of poorer populations, they came to be regarded as eyesores, as danger zones. How did these changes occur? How did public housing begin? Which forces lobbied for it and against it? How do the people living in this housing see it?

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Gringolandia

Wed, 29 Aug 2018 13:26:00 GMT

Gringolandia
Buy Now: $320.00

Americans have been living the expat life in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, for more than 50 years. Recently, though, their numbers have increased dramatically. Real estate has boomed. Some residents seek all the amenities they have at home, but at half the price. Why do Americans choose to live abroad? How do they impact this locale, which was once a sleepy provincial town in the mountains of Mexico? How do the Mexican residents view these 'visitors' from the north? How do the two cultures co-exist, for better and worse?

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Mission Hill and the Miracle of Boston

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 14:49:00 GMT

Mission Hill and the Miracle of Boston
Buy Now: $320.00

The story of what happened to Mission Hill is the story of many of America's older ethnic neighborhoods. Seventy years ago, Mission Hill was an Irish neighborhood of homes and small stores in which people lived near their schools, their church, and their shopping area. But between 1940 and 1980 it changed: thousands of units of public housing were built and decayed there. Nearby hospitals expanded, displacing people from their homes. Developers and speculators bought and sold property and built twenty-story apartment houses. A new, poor population and an affluent professional population arrived to compete for parts of the old neighborhood.

Mission Hill and the Miracle of Boston is the story of urban renewal, racial conflict, and the struggle of a neighborhood to survive these changing times. Spokespeople include real estate developers, community activists, workers, and residents.

Today this film, completed in 1978, remains unique in presenting one neighborhood's social history set against the larger forces that reshaped a major American city. A must for courses in urban studies, race relations, and social problems. Widely used.

“...a skillfully wrought and moving film... Seen through the tumultuous story of one Irish Catholic city parish, told by the people who lived it, set in the grit of ethnic and class antagonisms, it opens a wide window for any course on American history, religion and society, or urban studies.”
— Harvey Cox, Harvard Divinity School and author of The Secular City

“This quite extraordinary film shows how ordinary neighborhood people, mostly Irish and blacks, were pitted against powerful real estate interests and Harvard University.”
— John O'Connor, The New York Times

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Neighbors

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 14:11:00 GMT

Neighbors
Buy Now: $295.00

When filmmaker Richard Rogers and producer Janet Mendelsohn were funded by the National Endowment for the Arts to make a film about the growing interest in neighborhood conservation, they chose Boston's South End — an ethnically and economically diverse community that, like many other American cities at the time, had found itself in the midst of the urban renewal process.

The resulting film, Neighbors: Conservation in a Changing Community examines the challenges and opportunities of neighborhood revitalization through the stories of 12 South End residents. The older, working class population is juxtaposed with the more affluent newcomers who are attracted by the prime location and historic architecture as well as the ethnic mix of the neighborhood. While documenting the differences among these residents, the film also reveals their common goals — to make their neighborhood a better place to live.

The film remains remarkably relevant for 21st century audiences.

“The issues raised by this award-winning film may be even more critical in today's urban communities than they were in 1977. Displacement isn't going away, it's accelerating as newly desirable neighborhoods are “discovered“ by young, relatively affluent newcomers. As the complex challenges continue, Neighbors bears witness to the human aspects of neighborhood change.” — Robert H. McNulty, President, Partners for Livable Communities

INCLUDED ON THE DVD:

Neighbors Revisited

Janet Mendelsohn, Susan Fanshel

color, 13 min, 2012

Producer Janet Mendelsohn and cameraman Kevin Burke return to the South End to interview several of the participants in the original film, including former congressman Mel King and two generations of the Young family. In the update, the dynamics of change in this complex community are brought into the present. With soaring property values, the South End has become one of the most desirable residential areas in Boston — while the gap between rich and poor has widened. As a companion to the original film, it will spark audiences to discuss similar issues that are impacting traditional neighborhoods across the country.

SELECTED SCREENINGS & AWARDS

Best Conservation Film of the Year, National Trust for Historic Preservation, 1978

Finalist, American Film Festival, 1978

Premier, Neighborhood Action Conference, USA 1978

Broadcast on Public and Commercial Television, 1978

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The Newcomers

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 14:11:00 GMT

The Newcomers
Buy Now: $295.00

The Newcomers is a film about economically threatened Appalachian people in transition. Fresh as the day it was made in 1963, the issues of immigration and migration and learning how to live with people who are different from one's self are as challenging and critical as ever.

The filmmaker George Stoney writes, “The Newcomers was made for a church audience. I suspect that that church audience shared my middle-class attitude towards 'hillbillies.' It was a re-enacted documentary but the family represented had gone through the experience of being newcomers in a community... It involves Appalachians recalling their own experiences of relocation to urban cities to find work. Over the years I have heard from a number of people whose families were in the original cast, so they seem to feel a certain sense of pride in the documentation...

But, for me, being exposed to them I felt was exposing myself to people I had always held in contempt. Getting to know them changed my attitude and I hope it also did for the middle class audience we made the film for. I suspect those class attitudes exist today and I hope that this film can continue to help change those attitudes.”

The Newcomers is used courtesy of the General Board of Global Ministries of The United Methodist Church.

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Ordinary Lives

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 13:51:00 GMT

Ordinary Lives
Buy Now: $295.00

Mumbai is the financial capital of India, which is predicted to be the most populated city in Asia in 2020. Today, half of the city’s population – 7 million people – are living in slums. Such demographics only exacerbate the economic issues and infrastructural problems that exist. While offering solutions to problems faced by the people living in areas of appalling housing, confined space, and extremely low incomes, the Indian government, NGOs and other research institutes treat people as if they are figures rather than human beings. Although several studies and films have been made on the issues of slums, their major focus lies in housing, infrastructure and other environment-related problems. They ignore the larger questions of how people are psychologically and socially shaped by their confined living spaces and how those residents, in turn, define the place they inhabit.

Ordinary Lives uncovers the living conditions of residents in a slum in Mumbai, focusing closely on the daily struggles of one joint family with ten members of three generations crammed in a 180-square-foot shack. This family represents those in India at the very bottom of the social hierarchy. The subordinate and poor – especially the young and the women – have different concerns from those of government officials, whose goal is to replace the slums with a new cosmopolitan, modern development modeled after those in Shanghai.

Through a poised juxtaposition of voices from both inside and outside the slums, the film re-examines issues such as poverty, human rights, and gender equality that have been troubling India and other developing countries.

SELECTED SCREENINGS & AWARDS

Eyes & Lenses IV - Competition of Ethnographic and Anthropologic Films, Poland, 2007

International Ethnographic Film Festival of the Royal Anthropological Institute, UK, 2007

Roving Eye Documentary Film Festival, Providence, RI, 2007

Parnü: International Film Festival, Estonia, 2007

Film South Asia 2007, Nepal

India International Women Film Festival, New Delhi, 2007

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The Shoemaker

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 07:47:00 GMT

The Shoemaker
Buy Now: $320.00

Deeply attached to his network of family and friends, the shoemaker has always assumed that he would spend his last years in his native village. When his children leave to work in a tourist town, the shoemaker follows and struggles to adapt to the isolation.

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Thread of The Needle

Mon, 27 Aug 2018 08:57:00 GMT

Thread of The Needle
Buy Now: $295.00

Ano Ravenia, a mountain village in Greece, young men leave to find work, learn a trade or serve in the Army while a young woman may leave her father’s house only to enter that of her husband. The unmarried girls remain in the village amoung the elderly folk, meeting together to embroider their trousseaus and chat. In a rural Greek community, it is not the role of women to express their point of view in public. The film allows the spectator to sit in one of these casual sewing sessions where the girls talk about their wishes and problems, most of which revolve around marriages that will change their lives.

SELECTED SCREENINGS & AWARDS

Margaret Mead Film Festival, New York, 1983

Bilan du Film Ethnographique, France, 1984

Broadcast, ERT II, Greece, 1984

Films in the Greek series:

Charcoal-Makers

Every Day Is Not A Feast Day

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We Are Not Beggars

Fri, 24 Aug 2018 12:26:00 GMT

We Are Not Beggars
Buy Now: $295.00

This documentary depicts the life of several child street performers in a contemporary Chinese city. These children had been wandering the country as street performers for four years and are virtual "untouchables" to most Chinese.

The camera follows them in their daily rounds through the streets, performing acrobatic tricks and begging. It captures their daily struggles for survival and their dream to return home and go to school and looks at how these children face the challenges of a harsh environment with inner strength. Through this program, we have a window on a little-known aspect of Chinese society today and the realities facing so many of the world's children.

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