One October

2017, 56 minutes

Presented by: Director Rachel Shuman

Director: Rachel Shuman

ONE OCTOBER is a lyrical time capsule that offers a window into the shifting heart of New York City. Filmed entirely in October of 2008, a time when gentrification is rapidly displacing the working and middle classes, Wall Street is plummeting, and Senator Obama is making his first presidential bid, the story begins with Clay Pigeon, an intrepid radio host who takes to the streets of New York City to talk to everyday citizens who are facing the uncertainty of change.

Nuanced, cinematic, and often humorous, ONE OCTOBER charts the chasm between one’s desires and one’s means, explores the urgent need to conserve the old amid the glorification of the new, and affirms the notion that a varied streetscape is essential to the health of a dynamic metropolis. Seen from our current vantage point, the film is also a remarkable time capsule that foreshadows the roiling political upheaval spreading across the country today.

 

Presented as part of the Neighborhood Design Center’s Reverberations: The Roots and Relevance of Community Design conference. Details about NDC and the conference can be found here.

 

Director Bio: Rachel Shuman is a documentary filmmaker and editor who has worked in New York City for 20 years. Her directorial debut Negotiations premiered at the 2005 Tribeca Film Festival. She co-directed Art, Architecture, and Innovation: Celebrating the Guggenheim Museum, which aired on PBS and is now on view at the museum. Her editing credits include Five Seasons: The Gardens of Piet Oudolf (DOC NYC 2017), Wallace (Class 5 Films), Peter Eisenman (Checkerboard Films), and After the Cup (Variance Films). Rachel has also worked as an editor on nonfiction programming for A&E, History, and MTV and she is proud to be a board member of the Karen Schmeer Film Editing Fellowship. Originally from Boston, Rachel received a BFA from the California College of the Arts in San Francisco and an MFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York.