Educational Media Reviews Online

This disc is a compilation of five slice-of-life documentary shorts capturing insights into activities of men living in New York City.

C-Rock follows boys and men as they jump off a cliff holding a big letter C into the Harlem River. Older men reminisce and share memories of jumping off the cliff.

Taxi Garage features Spider, a taxi driver still working at 90+ years of age. We meet other drivers as well as the spunky Jewish dispatcher and gain insights into the taxi business. An inside look at a few guys who drive taxis and their caricatured Jewish dispatcher. The most interesting character is Spider, a 90+ year old black man who has been driving cab since the 1940’s. Even though he gets scant screen time, he and the dispatcher show what it’s like to work in a New York taxi garage. Immigrants and newbies learn how to drive in winter weather learning the ropes from experienced cabbies. Women seem absent from taxi driving as a career. This a study of a passing era thanks to ride sharing services, smart phone apps and self-driving cars. This is a shorter version of the movie Drivers Wanted (2012).

One Track Mind profiles Phillip Coppola, a man who has photographed, sketched, and written books about the NY City subway system, its stations and history. Rather than focusing on what Phillip has learned over the years and sharing his knowledge, this short attempts to understand why Phillip has devoted his life to learning about the subway. We follow Phillip as he traverses NYC conducting his search for knowledge. Phillip laments that with all the years he has spent on his labor of love, he’s explored only two lines of the vast subway system.

A Son’s Sacrifice depicts a man as he gives up a successful marketing career to take over his father’s halal slaughterhouse. Taking over the reins of a family business is fraught with opportunities for conflict and power struggles.The same dynamics might apply to any business being passed on from father to son. The focus is on the process of giving up a prosperous life for one that is based on religious tradition. One wonders whether the slaughterhouse can provide for the son’s family as he tries to make a go of it.

Black Cherokee. If you’ve driven on FDR Drive in Harlem you may have encountered a black man performing and posing along the side of the road. This film answers the question, ‘Why is he doing that?” There is meaning behind the performances. After watching this move you’ll understand what drives Black Cherokee to create his public exhibitions.

The anthology begs the question: Are there no women in NYC who have equally interesting stories? I couldn’t help but wonder why there isn’t a single woman featured. How can you have a collection purporting to be about “True NY” without featuring women equally? Nevertheless, the films are decent character studies of a handful of New York’s more eccentric men. Homesick New Yorkers might watch these shorts to remind themselves of the Big Apple.

One Track Mind and Black Cherokee could be used in classes about obsessive behavior. Taxi Garage is a nice historical record of a profession that will soon be extinct. C-Rock will do if you need a clip about rites of passage for young men. New Yorkers will find these movies satisfying and endearing.