Today, Manhattan is a byword for overpriced property, overexposed landmarks and overdressed fashionistas. In the late 70s, however, it was rat-infested, crime-crippled, cheap and nasty - somewhere for America to dump its immigrants, poor people and artists. Music, art, fashion and filmmaking burgeoned, fueled by drugs, dares, fads, feuds, and a fair helping of madness.
Blank City (2011) is director Céline Danhier's clip and interview-rich documentary on the downtown New York scene of the early 1980s. It features lots of time capsule imagery and comments by a host of infamous participants, including Jim Jarmusch, Debbie Harry, Steve Buscemi, John Waters, John Lurie, Lydia Lunch, Richard Kern, Thurston Moore, Fab 5 Freddy, Amos Poe, and James Chance. A bucketload of arty excitement and now-vanished filth.
