Urban Life Films

Reset filters

Men Who Dance the Giglio

Men Who Dance the Giglio

Men Who Dance the Giglio

A documentary on the Brooklyn St. Paulinus Festival. This film explores ethnicity, cultural traditions, and religious devotion as the performers, participants, and community…

Urban Gospel Ministry of Robert and Lily Butler

Urban Gospel Ministry of Robert and Lily Butler

Urban Gospel Ministry of Robert and Lily Butler

Ms. Butler and her son, the Reverend Rober Butler, play at folk festivals and churches throughout New York City

Style Wars

1983 | 1h 9mins

1983 | 1h 9mins

New York's legendary Kings of Graffiti own a special place in the hip hop pantheon. Style Wars is regarded by many as the definitive document of the emerging hip hop culture, an…

From Shore to Shore

From Shore to Shore

From Shore to Shore

A film on Irish immigrant musicians and their offspring, tracing the influences of family and community, ethnic identity, and American popular culture on the traditional music…

Halsted Street USA

Halsted Street USA

Halsted Street USA

Nowhere in America does a stretch of pavement slice through a more vibrant and diverse cross-section of humanity than Chicago's Halsted Street. Along its length one can view a…

Mermaids, Frog Legs, and Fillets

Mermaids, Frog Legs, and Fillets

Mermaids, Frog Legs, and Fillets

Long before the advent of hip-hop as a multi-million dollar industry, African Americans were rapping and rhyming in the street, in their neighborhoods, and on the fish market…

Look Forward and Carry on the Past

Look Forward and Carry on the Past

Look Forward and Carry on the Past

“Look Forward and Carry on the Past": Stories from Philadelphia’s Chinatown” illustrates the strength and complexity of Philadelphia’s only remaining community of color in the…

And This Is Free

And This Is Free

And This Is Free

And This Is Free (1965) a personal vision of life around Chicago's Maxwell Street open air market shot by the photographer Mike Shea capturing the gritty urban landscape that…

Kings of Christmas

Kings of Christmas

Kings of Christmas

The Kings of Christmas, introduces the men and women, the vast majority of whom are Italian-American, behind the biggest, brightest, and most over-the-top holiday decorated houses…

Sadobabies: Runaways in San Francisco

Sadobabies: Runaways in San Francisco

Sadobabies: Runaways in San Francisco

A 1988 8mm video documentary about the street children of San Francisco. The video documents the expressive traditions of a group of young runaways who formed an alternative…

Sometimes I Run

Sometimes I Run

Sometimes I Run

1973 portrait of Stanley Maupin who cleans sidewalks at night for the Dallas Department of Sanitation. A film by Blaine Dunlap with music by Ken Watson.

Closing Time

The New York real estate market forces the oldest store in Little Italy to shut down. The film is a portrait of a family, of the neighborhood that used to be and of the way the…

Music District

The Music District is a one-hour documentary profiling four African American traditional music groups practicing and performing for fans and congregants in the neighborhood…

Showing page 2 of 2.