This 10 minute short film is the personal story of the director's experience growing up in an old building on Manhattan's Lower East Side. Made a few years after he moved out (presumably to go away to college, based on the years cited, but this is never explicitly stated) at the moment his parents moved out. The narration focuses on the past "lives" of the same building, over 100+ years. The writer/director and his parents are heard, off-camera, reflecting on their experience living in that building, in the context of their time spent there representing only one chapter in the building's own successive purposes: a synagogue, a factory, artists' loft, etc. Their sensitivity to the building's prior history is particularly touching.
The film is thought-provoking (or, perhaps more accurately, thought-inducing) in that, without ever lapsing into preaching, it invites the viewer to reflect on the fact that every building in NYC has a history in itself that in many cases spans several human lifetimes. This is in contrast with the construction boom in Manhattan that so often spells the end of those historical buildings, in the unending search for more square footage.
And the fate of this particular building after the director's parent move out? I won't spoil it for you.
The film is thought-provoking (or, perhaps more accurately, thought-inducing) in that, without ever lapsing into preaching, it invites the viewer to reflect on the fact that every building in NYC has a history in itself that in many cases spans several human lifetimes. This is in contrast with the construction boom in Manhattan that so often spells the end of those historical buildings, in the unending search for more square footage.
And the fate of this particular building after the director's parent move out? I won't spoil it for you.