Here's what Criterion has to say about the 65-minute film:
Lionel Rogosin's landmark of American neorealism chronicles three days in the drinking life of Ray Salyer, a part-time railroad worker adrift on New York's skid row, the Bowery. When the film first opened in 1956, it exploded onto the screen, burning away years of Hollywood artifice, jump-starting America’s postwar independent-film scene ...
Developed in close collaboration with the men Rogosin met while spending months hanging out in neighborhood bars, "On the Bowery" is both an indispensable document of a bygone Manhattan and a vivid and devastating portrait of addiction.The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 1957.
Check out the trailer here...
Metrograph is at 7 Ludlow St. just north of Canal. Find the movie times here.
And this screening is part of a larger Rogosin retrospective at the theater.
6 comments:
Saw this several years ago, still quite vivid in my mind today. What has changed since then is a better understanding of mental illness and addiction while back in the day these people were simply "drunks".
How far we think we have come yet these people are seen living on streets today while many of us live in comparable luxury.
The stories of the filmmakers in the aftermath of this film is equally dramatic. One of the crew became and alcoholic, and the star of the film disappeared after being overwhelmed by Hollywood. The film and the real life story are fascinating and heartbreaking.
The good old days? Bad old days of the Bowery. How well I remember. I saw things there that no one would believe. If you look hard enough you can still see them.
Great movie and real life stories so interesting (and sad).
Seminal film. Rogosin was considered the greatest living documentarian by John Cassavetes. Son of a wealthy Russian Jew - he ended up owning the Bleecker Street Cinema. Film is also available to stream on Amazon. This is a must watch.
Movie is Bogusity.Is pretty much rip off of Travelog film made by Paramount or
or other big studio in early 1940s.Both movies can be seen on Youtube or TCM.Dont be fooled by imitations.
Watch "Vapors" 1965 instead on Youtube even though it gets cut midway thru thanks to Something Weird Video.They want you to pay to see the rest of it,the greedy varmints
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