Empire City

A film essay contrasting the modern metropolis with its "golden age" from 1830-1930, with the participation of some of New York's leading political and cultural figures. Made at a time when the city was experiencing unprecedented real estate development on the one hand and unforeseen displacement of population and deterioration on the other. Empire City is the story of two New Yorks. The film explores the precarious coexistence of the service-based midtown Manhattan corporate headquarters with the peripheral New York of undereducated minorities living in increasing alienation.

1985-07-01 | en

That World Is Gone

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.

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One Big Home

On the tiny island of Martha's Vineyard, where presidents and celebrities vacation, trophy homes threaten to destroy the islands unique character. Twelve years in the making, One Big Home follows one carpenters journey to understand the trend toward giant houses. When he feels complicit in wrecking the place he calls home, he takes off his tool belt and picks up a camera.

2017-07-14 | en

Salem Witch Trials

Salem, Massachusetts. A small town—with no clear governing body—became embroiled in a scandal that forever stands as one of the darkest chapters in American history. For those accused of witchcraft by their neighbors and friends, there was little chance of clearing their names; the mass paranoia that ravaged through the community took the lives of 19 innocent men and women.

2002-12-24 | en

The Street

The baker, the pie-maker and the diminished long-term community of Hoxton Street face gentrification in this compelling portrait of a rapidly changing London.

2019-11-29 | en

A Rats Arse

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.

2020-10-10 | en

Gentrified: Ethnic Cleansing American Style

The first in-depth analysis of the unspoken ethnic component behind the most devastating socio-economic movement in America today.

2017-02-11 | en

I Remember a Time When No One Jogged in This Neighbourhood

With its fluid arrangement of black and white scenes paired with an immersive soundscape, Je me souviens d’un temps où personne ne joggait dans ce quartier is a celebration of the many faces of Park Extension. The film provides a glimpse inside a festive cultural gathering; the workshop of a meticulous artisan; and an alley where a young cyclist is learning to ride. With her restrained approach, the filmmaker hints little by little at a seemingly inevitable transformation, while the relentless onset of gentrification threatens the social fabric of a neighbourhood. After a critically acclaimed detour into audio documentary, Jenny Cartwright returns to the evocative force of images to evoke a rich and diverse community.

2021-10-22 | xx

Quartiers sous tension

2017-08-12 | fr

I Am Gentrification. Confessions of a Scoundrel

Is the city of Zurich suffering from ‘density stress’? What is it like to live in mega cities such as São Paulo, Mexico City and Tiflis? Filmmaker Thomas Haemmerli broaches the topics of city development, architecture, density, housing market, xenophobia and gentrification from an autobiographical perspective. The path of his life has led him from a childhood in the villa district of Zürichberg, through his teenage years as squatter to flat shares, yuppie apartments and finally second homes in various cities. Only recently having become a dad, he plans to further enhance Zurich’s price appreciation by purchasing a huge, extended city apartment… This multifaceted essay not only humorously questions the filmmaker’s decisions, but also those of the right-wing conservatives, who are afraid of losing their space to immigrants, and the political left, who fail to embrace modern-age architecture.

2018-10-18 | de

Flag Wars

Filmed over four years, this documentary focuses on the impacts of gentrification as gay white professionals move into a largely black working-class neighborhood in Columbus, Ohio.

2003-05-01 | en

The Iron Triangle: Willets Point and the Remaking of New York

Targeted for several failed redevelopment plans dating back to the days of Robert Moses, Willets Point, a gritty area in New York City known as the “Iron Triangle,” is the home of hundreds of immigrant-run, auto repair shops that thrive despite a lack of municipal infrastructure support. During the last year of the Bloomberg Administration, NYC’s government advanced plans for a “dynamic” high-end entertainment district that would completely wipe out this historic industrial core. The year is 2013, and the workers of Willets Point are racing against the clock to forestall their impending eviction. Their story launches an investigation into New York City’s history as the front line of deindustrialization, urban renewal, and gentrification.

2017-11-11 | en

Copan

A microcosm of everything Brazil stands for: the good, the bad and the ugly. This immersive and intimate portrait of the largest residential building in Latin America and its inhabitants shines a light on a country being torn apart by corruption, populism, polarized politics and a collapsing democracy.

2025-03-25 | pt

Cruel Architecture, a Tool of Gentrification

A short documentary shot in November 2021 in Berkeley. It reflects on the ethos of privatization in American culture and how public spaces are being built to exclude people through cruel architecture. The context used is the gentrification circle around the University of California Berkeley intended to build student housing. An eye-opening journey that explores structures and elements you would never have stopped at.

2021-12-18 | en

The Battle of New Orleans: A Meaningful Victory

The Battle of New Orleans: A Meaningful Victory explores how the British misjudged their opponent and miscalculated the complexities of the battle ground. It also describes why the multi-cultural population of New Orleans proved the naysayers wrong about their loyalties to a young nation. WYES Community Projects Producer Marcia Kavanaugh and Tom Gregory hosted and produced this documentary.

2015-01-07 | en

Seattle Freeway Revolt

In the 1950s, Seattle had plans to build one of the densest networks of freeways in the world. It would have displaced thousands, especially the poor and people of color. Over the next two decades, a broad coalition of communities came together and halted these plans. Testimonies from that era are juxtaposed with interviews of activists who participated in the revolt, giving a picture of what Seattle could have been had the people not stood up to the highway lobby and their representatives.

2020-01-01 | en

Ramps to Nowhere

A film about the cross coalition of communities that stopped a planned network of freeways from being built in Seattle in the late 60s and early 70s. It weaves together archival material with the filmmaker's personal narrative about living next to freeways, and features interviews with participants from the freeway revolt.

2018-09-01 | en

This House Is Not A Home

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.

2015-08-28 | en

Bestseller Barcelona: The World of Carlos Ruiz Zafón

A journey through the fantastic and mysterious Barcelona that the Spanish writer Carlos Ruiz Zafón (1964-2020) loved so much, the city of myth and legend, the city that was before it became one of the main European tourist destinations.

2022-10-19 | de

Whispers of Concrete

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.

2021-10-14 | es