Review of Downtown '81 (2001) by Jenny G — 05 Feb 2011

The voiceover in the beginning of this says something about fairy tales coming true, and the biggest fairy tale is paying $422 to live on the Lower East Side. Of course, when this was made it was still bombed out, beautiful, and covered with poetic graffiti instead of ugly cold glass high rises and corporate sponsored pseudo "street" art by Nintendo.

There's not a real narrative but what there is seems certainly relatable.. I mean, Basquiat at this time is an up and coming artist. He goes to the hospital, falls behind on rent, tags his thoughts in public spaces.

There are nightclubs, strip joints(with some surly TG strippers! And Cookie Mueller. And the Contortions playing, like back when strippers didn't have to listen to Beyonce all day long.), having a band, unsolved crime.

The guy with the weed is not as cool as he thinks, but he's the guy with the weed. The person who actually has the money to buy art is more interested in if it matches her dining room than what it actually expresses.

Throughout the course of this there are performances by a bunch of bands like DNA, James White & the Blacks(James Chance),The Plastics, etc. that I'm seriously depressed about having been too young to have caught.

The one thing I could have done without is a sub-plot about Jean's flirtation with a very mainstream conventional fashion model cuz, you know, I'm not a 14 year old boy where I think it would be mad cool to date a supermodel.

Also because it's weak when self-styled "bohemian" boys get intimidated by girls with comparable creativity, talent, or at least knowledge of obscure music, art, comics and what have you, so they claim to be one way but select uninteresting normal female partners.

Also because I've had it confirmed that at that point in his career Basquiat was not gettin' down with norms (if he ever did, I dunno.) Fortunately, this sub-plot remains very minor in the film and ultimately goes nowhere.

Apparently this was someone's student film, but it looks pretty polished.