blank city

So first of all, for true New Yorkers who have any sort of nostalgia for NYC in the gritty 70s or 80s, you have to see Blank City. The footage, the music, once in a while, even the interviews. It's a wonderfully, chaotic walk through an incredibly vital period for art that was outside the mainstream in those decades, not just cinema, as the movie demonstrates.
In many ways the direction and editing of this documentary mirrors the chaos of the time period that its content seeks to cover. This may be partly a reflection of the small insular group of people you sit with, it's hard for the outsider to get everything. It's also edited so fast at times that you can barely read a name before the person is gone. For all the money they spent on the wonderful visuals they could have spent a little on the audio mix, or even checking the end credits for typos.
But ignore my quibbling because once you hear these filmmakers talk about the glory days, like Jim Jarmusch telling the story of making his first movie, it makes it all worth it. Playing now at IFC.