B/SIDE

by Abigail CHILD
1996 / 16mm / color-b&w / sound / 1S / 38' 00

Child's B/side is a provocative exploration of the urban homeless, combining sensitive footage of their exterior situation and entering imaginatively into interior fantasies. Framed by footage of the encampment locally known as Dinkinsville on New York’s Lower East Side, where some of the homeless of Thompkins Square Park settled after the riots of June l991, the movie begins with the encampment's first night and ends with the fire and subsequent destruction of the lot in October of the same year. Applying rhythmic construction, poetic license and a generous eye to bodies in poverty, B/side documents a gritty vision of late 20th century urban life.

“B/side shows the other side of Reagonomics. Director Abigail Child combines documentary with fiction and smart wit in a poetic montage to present a complicated and heartfelt portrait of colonialism at home. These events take place only a mile from Wall Street. The public is forced to look, even as the position of the camera changes. Sometimes the camera is the bystander, at other moments it is the perspective of the homeless themselves.” — The Daily, Rotterdam Film Festival

1 PRINT IN DISTRIBUTION


distribution format 16mm
screen 1,37 - Standard (single screen)
speed 24 fps
sound optical sound
original language English
rental fee 128,00 €