The first in depth analysis of the unspoken ethnic component behind the most devastating socio-economic movement in America today.
Denim' is a poetic short film by writer, poet and performer Siana Bangura, exploring gentrification and social cleansing in South East London. Through a personal trip down memory lane, visiting the places that moulded her, we learn what happens when the city changes and leaves those who built it behind. Travelling through Bermondsey, Rotherhithe, Elephant & Castle, Walworth Road, Peckham, Brixton and of course Shoreditch, 'Denim' is both a personal tale and a wider social commentary.
Nicknamed "The Black Beverly Hills," View Park, Baldwin Hills, and Ladera Heights, are unarguably the three most wealthiest black neighborhoods in the world. Residences from the neighborhoods tell stories of their personal upbringings, past and present history of their neighborhoods, and their own views and opinions of the changing demographics.
Jose Rivera is a lifelong resident of Spanish Harlem (El Barrio) but is afraid that gentrification will force him out. James Garcia has just bought an apartment across the street from public housing and wonders why locals resist his moving into the neighborhood. James Barrow worries that a construction project in an empty lot behind his building will threaten his apartment. Oscar Dominguez and Movement for Justice in El Barrio protests against gentrification. A town hall meeting pits community members against a City Councilwoman who supports a massive development project in East Harlem.
The Domino Effect is a feature length documentary film that explores the origins and impacts of gentrification and luxury redevelopment in Williamsburg and Greenpoint, Brooklyn under the Bloomberg administration. The film follows the rezoning of the Domino Sugar Factory on the East River waterfront and delves deep into the politics and economics of urban development on the frontier of Brooklyn’s gentrification. Told through the voices of longtime residents, the film conveys the personal impact of gentrification while shedding light on the struggles faced by communities across the nation. Will your neighborhood be the next to fall?
Sitting at the intersection of two main arteries of traffic on Melbournes Northside is a giant yellow rat that is pointing, with a long gnarled claw, to its explicitly large bottom. This yellow rat is the mascot for the small business Glenlyon Motors. This unusual mascot and the absence of an explanation for its existence has many residents of Melbournes north side puzzled. 'A Rats Arse' finally answers the question on every Northside residents lips - “Why?!” - and along the way reveals something about identity, values, community, and the people who exist within them.
The Oven Sky (2011) is set in a quickly gentrifying neighborhood where newcomers pressure a longtime resident to turn her yard filled with lawn ornaments into a dog park. This animation features music by Rachel Mason.
Kathy's family left on a Saturday morning in 1965. The rumble of bulldozers echoed through the neighborhood, and her block was empty. Federally-funded urban renewal had arrived in Charlottesville, scattering dozens of families like Kathy's. The once-vibrant African American community, built by formerly enslaved men and women who had secured a long-denied piece of the American dream, disappeared.
In an historically Black neighborhood of Cincinnati, a family closes shop as new residents roll in on their Segways and craft beer carts.
The twelfth edition of the International Meeting of Collective Architectures was held in Palma de Mallorca, in the neighborhoods of La Soledat, Nou Llevant and Es Molinar, at the end of September 2019. The meeting focused on the imposition of false paradises and the description of the current mechanisms of urban transformation that expel people from their neighborhoods.
A short documentary about gentrification and tenant activism in one Toronto neighbourhood, "This House Is Not A Home" presents a poignant and informative look into resident experiences in Parkdale.
Right to Wynwood is an investigative documentary that explores the causes and effects of gentrification in Wynwood. Through interviews with developers, gallerists, artists, community leaders, and members of the local Puerto Rican population, we seek to tell the story of how Wynwood went from Miami's oldest Puerto Rican community to its largest art district, and what that means for the future of the neighborhood.
In 1959 New York City announced a "slum clearance plan" by Robert Moses that would displace 2,400 working class and immigrant families, and dozens of businesses, from the Cooper Square section of Manhattan's Lower East Side. Guided by the belief that urban renewal should benefit - not displace - residents, Frances Goldin and her neighbors formed the Cooper Square Committee and launched a campaign to save the neighborhood. Over five decades they fought politicians, developers, white flight, government abandonment, blight, violence, arson, drugs, and gentrification - cyclical forces that have destroyed so many working class neighborhoods across the US. Through tenacious organizing and hundreds of community meetings, they not only held their ground but also developed a vision of community control. Fifty three years later, they established the state's first community land trust - a diverse, permanently affordable neighborhood in the heart of the "real estate capital of the world."
Berlin is changing. The film maker interviewed and accompanied real estate agents and investors and filmed tenants struggling to cope with the situation.
In recent years, the Marga Marga Province has witnessed a drastic change in the visual and sound landscape due to urban expansion. Faced with the observation and the need to explore the territory that seems more and more alien and less and less our own, the film functions as a material resource and support for plastic reflection on living in the midst of capitalist progress.
Facing eviction the oldest black-owned gay bar in Brooklyn relies on a passionate community in its fight for survival.