The Get By: Making It on the Streets of NYC

On February 4, 1999, 19 of the 41 shots fired in 10 seconds by 4 NYPD Street Crimes Unit cops hit Guinean immigrant Amadou Diallo as he stood in the vestibule of the building where he lived in the Bronx…. This video essay seizes on the grotesque factual precision of this numerical data, proceeding with an intense contemplation of how police violence is produced and then addressed by other forces on the city streets.

Some of the world's best jazz, R & B, hip-hop, rap, gospel and Latin musicians perform classic and modern songs in this 2004 benefit show celebrating the 70th year of Harlem's famed Apollo Theater. Performers include Natalie Cole, Ashanti, Brian McKnight, Yolanda Adams with the Abyssinian Baptist Choir, James Ingram, Herbie Hancock, Branford Marsalis, Doug E. Fresh, Slick Rick, Patti LaBelle, Angie Stone and Arturo Sandoval.

Barneys' closing sale.

Les Trésors des plus beaux Jardins français

A documentary revealing why America's school closures lasted longer than almost any other nation. Framed as a forensic analysis of what happened to children during school closures, it blends director Natalya Murakhver's perspective as a Soviet immigrant with voices of children and families nationwide, exposing devastating learning loss, mental health crises, and inequality.

This film visits many of the neighborhoods and landmarks on Manhattan Island and occasionally includes a history lesson. The neighborhoods include the Bowery, Chinatown, Herald Square, and Times Square. Some of the architectural highlights are the Empire State Building, the New York Public Library, Temple Emanuel, the Central Park Zoo, and the Rockefeller Center complex. The film ends with a visit to a dining room in the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, where the Xavier Cugat Orchestra entertains.

N.Y.H.C. is the first feature-length documentary to explore the New York Hardcore music scene. Drawings its roots from punk rock, hardcore evolved into a dedicated, self-contained movement, unconcerned with success in the mainstream. The documentary follows seven bands in the summer of 1995, ranging from Bronx inner-city youth to Long Island suburbanites to Hare Krishna devotees. N.Y.H.C. is a surprisingly in-depth and non-exploitive look into a vital and often neglected music community.

So often a documentary will try to capture the supposed real experience of life in New York City, and fail miserably. Usually this is because the filmmaker tries to incorporate larger-than-life characters, and give his audience just one somewhat overwhelming experience of life on this busy little island. In the NY Pizza Confessions, Finbarr Wilbrink, instead focuses his camera on plain everyday people, and the result is genuine New York.

A documentary following the 2021 campaign of Paperboy Love Prince, a rapper and activist, for Mayor of New York

A depiction of New York’s subway as an absurd obstacle course – revealing a system that shuts many out of a city in motion.

Throughout the 1950s and into the 1960s the communities of Cannonsville, Granton, Rock Rift, Rock Royal, Johnny Brook and Beerston, NY were destroyed to make way for the Cannonsville Reservoir. The reservoir would serve as the last piece of New York City’s growing water infrastructure in a battle of upstate versus downstate. 60 years after vacating or moving their homes, former residents gather at their annual town reunion to reflect and reminisce on their memories and the collective trauma that they share.

Originally produced for The Learning Channel, this documentary aims to dissect the events surrounding the September 11th terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, addressing many of the questions that still continue to haunt the public. Through CGI graphics, interviews with witnesses and discussions with those who designed and engineered the buildings, this program examines the horrific incident in full detail.

Meet the dirtiest cop in NYC history. Michael Dowd stole money and dealt drugs while patrolling the streets of '80s Brooklyn.

Emily Maitlis tells the story of Donald Trump, the world's most famous developer, who changed the New York skyline with his glitzy towers and made himself a multi-billionaire.

Chinatown has had a big hit in 2020 with many business closing down, community members getting harassed and attacked by hate crimes. Yet the community perseveres as the artist continues to work. Henry Chang, born and raised in Chinatown, continues to live and work on Mott street. Part of the self-reclaimed “OG crew” of China- town, he is adored and respected by his community the way community leaders are. While prepping to shoot, Corky Lee, a legendary Asian-American photographer and friend to Henry for over a half a century, died of Covid. Corky's presence and art naturally seeped its way into the film. Henry Chang, the unofficial official community leader of Chinatown walks us through life and art as we transition from the Year of the Rat to the Year of the Ox.

A crumbling pier, its walls covered with graffiti and erotic frescoes reminiscent of pagan Pompeii, the locus of the seduction rituals of men longing for men, is the focus of this meditation on gay cruising at the height of sexual freedom before AIDS. Shot in 1982, this is the first segment of a film capturing the life, death, and rebirth of the legendary “sex piers” over the last three decades.

A diverse group of LGBT individuals in New York City, offering a vivid mosaic of queer American life in the 21st century.

A mix of documentary and scripted footage on the Bowery, New York City's skid row. Against a backdrop of men (and a few women) drinking in bars, talking and arguing, and sleeping on sidewalks, we have the story of Ray.

Thousands of people walk past a Manhattan jewelry store everyday, unaware of the hair salon directly beneath their feet. This documentary goes downstairs to capture the life of Joey P. Ryan — a hairdresser and performer that has navigated a lifetime of obstacles to finally exist on his own terms. Interviews explore themes of pride, identity, artistry, and self-expression.

Amid the frenetic pace of New York City, a group of young musicians confronts the paradox of pursuing a professional career in the world of jazz while struggling for economic survival. Their experience highlights how, at times, artistic life and financial stability appear to follow irreconcilable paths.