DOWNTOWN 81

Glasjaw's "Cosmopolitan Bloodloss"
This Film's Crap, Let's Download The Soundtrack (though)

cheers i'll check it out

NO NEW YORK, on the other hand, is entirely comprised of 'No Wave' bands (hence the title) and is largely a discordant assault on the senses, and the perfect thing to play loudly at your neighbors when in the mood to stir up trouble.

Yeah, the Disco Donuts is now a pharmacy, I believe. I live on 12th street, just a stone's throw from it.

I can see how you'd think the film is tedious, Nathalie. In fact, as film, it's pretty shit. The acting is deplorable. The plot is tenuous to the point of non-existence, and the production values are well sub-par. However, the music portions are fantastic (totally made me appreciate Kid Creole & the Coconuts....a band I'd otherwise have sooner completely written off) and the very fact that it depics a long, gone incarnation of New York City (when it as dangerous, fun, exciting, culturally thriving, gritty, etc.) directly appeals to my stridently sentimentalist/nostalgic sensibility. I still walk around many of the locations of this film, and you'd absolutely never recognize it. I did spot something recently that gave me pause, though: in the alley between Canal Street and 77 White Street (the old location of the Mudd Club), someone had scrawled in tiny white letter: "IT'S NOT THE SAMO ANYMORE!"....a reference to Basquiat's cryptic graffitti that used to adorn the walls of downtown Manhattan. 'Samo' pronounced "say-mo," as in the "same old, same old."

If you were ever planning a pilgrimage to NYC in appreciation of "Downtown 81" (or...for that matter...Scorcese's "After Hours," or "Desperately Seeking Susan" or "Blank Generation" or any of those films....) don't bother. It's a changed place. That NYC is gone forever, it seems.

i'd love to see this film regardless of it's wackness, as an obsessive new yorkist who's never been there. i've been to the REAL old york tho'. SO, what's the best post-punk mid-80's whatever definitve roll of film out of 'wildstyle' and 'downtown 81', or are they incomparable?

interesting (telling?) that saul williams finished off basquiat's narration

I still remember the early-to-mid '80s East Village very vividly (even though I was just a kid back then). All the graffiti and the dirt and the rats in the streets and exhaust pollution and the shithole coffee shops and scary-looking biker bars and and early hip-hop/club music and people with fucked-up hair added up to something really colorful and vibrant. A lot of that flavor has been lost, thanks to the Starbucks/NYU monopoly on the area. It's still a great area though.

so fav tune off the film? - i like the plastics or james white and the blacks

Sometimes I like to hole up with movies depicting 1970s/'80s New York and get wistful. Downtown 81 is pretty good for that, but there are a few moments that burst the wist-bubble.

I'm Paul, by the way: newish here.

JBR, you and I doubtless crossed paths in our wayward youths.

The Disco Donuts was on the southwest corner of 3rd Avenue and 14th Street (the KFC you speak of is on the southwest corner of 2nd Avenue). Disco Donuts was right down the street from the since-torn-down Palladium (the spot currently occupied by a massive NYU dormitory and a PC Richards appliance outlet). The only reason I really remember the Disco Donuts was because back in 1982, I went to go see Devo on the "Oh No! It's Devo" tour at the Palladium, and waited for my ride back uptown in the Disco Donuts afterwards. It's also right around the corner and down the street from the fabled "Taxi Driver" block (13th & 3rd), where Robert DeNiro's Travis Bickle shoots Hary Keitel's Longhaird Pimp in a doorway.

Oh, I guess that would be a good reason why people are just finding out about it! :-)

I got to see it at a press screening in summer 2001, so I'm obviously much cooler than any of you people.

Ah, this is a particularly pointless digression. Please ignore.

all voices in the film were dubbed over 'cause they lost the original soundtrack somewhere in Italy

I think much of the live music tracks survived, though i'm not sure... does anyone know?

Wasn't Walter Steding irritating?

anyway, i was wondering at the similarities twixt tha 2

Well I plunked down my ten ducats and saw it at the same time, so nah. (I saw it alone, too, because none of my ign'ant friends knew who any of the people in it were. and I was working at a college radio station!!!)

Oh, and I saw it in 2001 as well.....do I win something?

Yes, I'm aware. :-)

so a few months ago there was a youtube clip posted everywhere of jools holland and leslie ash hitting the clubs in NYC circa 83, meeting arthur baker, the peech boys, visiting the roxy the garage the danceteria. but the clip has been taken down, anyone dl it while it was available or anything?

Would love to see that.

Plus the original, pre-Christopher Cross version of "Arthur's Theme" would have fit in perfect.
― James Blount (James Blount), Friday, 11 October 2002 05:06 (7 years ago)

???

I have that BBC doc somewhere. Pretty great except that Jools Holland is an annoying, unfunny dude.

haha that is true but srsly it is the only time i have even seen as much as a photo of the peech boys (seriously try gising them, you'll just get ten city)

I have that BBC doc somewhere. Pretty great except that Jools Holland is an annoying, unfunny dude.

― Zooster vs. The Slapp (Capitaine Jay Vee), Sunday, 22 August 2010 22:50 (1 week ago)

what's the name of this doc?