Directed by Diego Echeverria • 1984 • United States

Diego Echeverria’s vivid portrait of South Williamsburg, Brooklyn, in the early 1980s captures the challenges the neighborhood faced: poverty, drugs, gang violence, crime, abandoned real estate, racial tension, single-parent homes, and inadequate local resources. It also celebrates the vitality of this largely Puerto Rican and Dominican community, showing the strength of the culture, its creativity, and its residents’ determination to overcome a desperate situation. Unseen for decades before its triumphant reemergence, this documentary time capsule represents an invaluable piece of New York history.