My Favorite Answers

            Q1. What did you learn from the movie?

There are many things that I learned from watching the documentary “Dark Days” directed by Marc Singer including a new understanding of how homeless people live and how their life is a constant struggle. But I think the most important thing that I learned from watching this film was to not take the life I was given for granted, because life could me much, much worse. This documentary really opened my eyes to an entirely different world, the world of the homeless. Honestly, before I watched this documentary I had never really thought about the battle that homeless people fight everyday, but after viewing this film I cannot stop thinking about it. It’s constantly on my mind. I learned how homeless people will rummage through garbage just to find a few dollars worth of what they would consider treasure, but the average American would consider trash (Dark Days). I also learned that some homeless people, such as the ones in this documentary, would rather live in a dark, disgusting tunnel than in a homeless shelter, where at least they would have a nice meal and a warm bed. This fact really made me think, and I came to the conclusion that some homeless people really want to be self-reliant and do not want to have to rely on others to help them. This shows that they are strong willed people.

Q2. What surprised you?

What surprised me about the documentary “Dark Days” was the fact that human beings, just like you and me, were living in conditions that I would consider not suitable for any human to live in. Something that surprised me even more was the fact that the people living in those conditions where not even trying to change the way they lived. They were complacent and really showed no desire to change the life that they were living. This was a huge surprise to me because from what I understand it is human nature to want to try and better your life and not just accept the hand that was dealt to you, especially when the hand dealt to you is a two and a seven. A two and a seven, for anybody that does not understand what I mean is the worst possible hand that can be dealt to someone in Texas Hold’em poker (Bochan).

Q3. What questions remain after the viewing?

After finishing “Dark Days” there are still a few lingering questions in my mind. These are questions that I would ask Marc Singer the director of “Dark Days”. Where did the idea to film how homeless people lived come from? Why did you decide to make the movie in black and white when you could have made it in color? How many people lived in the tunnel, was it only the people shown in the documentary or were there others? Did you film everything that happened in the tunnel or did you leave certain things out? Did you actually live in the tunnel along side of the homeless, to get the entire experience or did you stay in some big, fancy hotel? The last question that I would ask Marc is would he ever consider filming another documentary like “Dark Days”?

These are questions that I would ask the homeless people if I had a chance to speak with some of them. How did you feel when some guy came down into the tunnel and asked if it was all right to film how you lived?  At first did you want to be filmed of did you what to be left alone to live your life? Was there any time during the filming process that you wanted Marc Singer to stop filming and leave you alone? If so, when? How did you feel when the news came in that you were going to be evicted from the tunnel? The last question I would ask them is if they had the chance to go back in time and change one thing in there life’s what would that one thing be?

Q6. Was there a specific scene or segment that stayed with you and caused you to be curious? delighted? angry? motivated?

Yes, there actually was one particular scene in the film that has stuck with me and that scene is when Marc Singer is filming Julio and Lee. In the scene Julio is the only one talking, but he cannot finish any of his sentences. Lee is sitting next to him and is just laughing at him has he tells Marc about his pet cats. I suspect that they were both high and both of their minds were shot from abusing drugs. This scene stuck with me because all I could think about was how I felt sorry for those two men. It almost even made me feel angry because I knew that these guys had ruined their entire lives and there was nothing that I could have done to prevent it.

Works Cited

Bochan, Toby. “Top 10 Worst Starting Hands in Texas Hold’em”. About. n.p, n.d. Web. 28 January 2015.

Dark Days. Dir. Marc Singer. Picture Farm, 2000. Film.