Just watched Dark Days, a film by Marc Singer. The story isn’t so much the story in the movie as the story of the movie. It is a documentary about how over 150 people came to live in an abandoned tunnel under penn station. The people are endearing and honest about themselves and how they got there. They’ve managed to build houses and wire them with electricity. They salvage thrown out cookware, refrigerators, televisions, couches etc. This is all very nice and interesting.
Then you find out how the movie was made. It’s the director’s first film. He was just hanging out with these guys and then they all decided to do a movie. The film is donated, the camera is rented, the crew is made up of homeless people, the tracking dolly is made out of shopping carts, and no one has a clue what they are doing.
It’s a miracle it got made. But you owe it to yourself to see a miracle every once in a while, and this is one. It won a slew of awards at sundance etc. Don’t just watch the movie, take time to explore the dvd. This is one dvd where the special features are worth an extra hour of poking around.
Get it from amazon, get it from netflix, but do check it out.
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