When a marriage of convenience becomes the real thing, Joe moves his pregnant French wife to a tenement building on New York's Lower East Side. The street is like a war zone with none of the nostalgic appeal that Joe remembers from tales of his immigrant grandparents arriving in the same neighborhood with a new life. This is the urban frontier filled with comic mixture of gentrifies, homeboys, dealers and local residents simply bent on staying a float
Acting
Clara Bellar's deadpan French exasperation saves every scene.
Direction
Alan Taylor pre-Game of Thrones, finding humanity in squalor.
Writing
Wendy Hammond's play adaptation bites harder than it hugs.
Director
Alan Taylor
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
This was Alan Taylor's second feature before he became HBO's go-to director for The Sopranos and Game of Thrones.
Based on Wendy Hammond's 1995 play, it captures that specific late-Clinton-era moment when 'revitalization' became a dirty word. FREE
US
