Further Reaction to "Dark Days"

It has been a couple of days sense I viewed "Dark Days" and randomly the thought of those poor homeless people still pops into my head. Every time I think about it makes me feel sad for not only the people in the film but also for all of the homeless people that where not lucky enough to be in this film. I say not lucky enough because at the end of the film the homeless people were put into apartments. When I view a film and a couple days later I am still thinking about it, that means that the film really brought out emotions from me. And his film surely did that. 

What I liked most about this film was that it was not staged or at least did not appear to be staged. It did not leave anything out. It shows exactly how the people in the tunnel survived, how they rummage through garbage just to find food, how they lived with rats as their neighbors, and how all most all of them were addicted to drugs. It showed how most of them were accepting the life that they were living and were not even trying to start a new. At some points the film got very depressing and all most hard to watch.

The most problematic part of the film to me was that these people did not even try to turn their life's around. I just don't understand why they would not try to find a job, any job would have turn their life's around. I mean they live in one of the biggest cities in the world so there had to be some sort of work for them. I truly believe that if someone really wants to find a job, then they will find a job. I really believe that these homeless people could have found some sort of work if they really tried.

If I had the chance to talk to one of the people in this documentary I would speak with Tommy. I would want to speak with Tommy because he was one of the people that had lived in the tunnel the longest. And he seemed, at least to me, to be the most intelligent one living down there. I would ask him why he chose to run away from home when he was so young? Why he chose to live in the tunnel instead of some sort of homeless shelter? I would ask him was he beginning to feel comfortable living in the tunnel? I would also ask him how he felt when he heard the news that he would have to leave his home in the tunnel? And then ask him how he felt when the news came that he was going to be able to leave the tunnel and live in an apartment?

This is an image of Tommy going out of the tunnel to go and search through garbage to find recyclables such as plastic bottles and medal cans to make a little bit of money.

If you get a chance I would really recommend watching this film.

Reflection on "Dark Days"

"Dark Days" by Marc Singer is a documentary about a group of homeless people that live in a tunnel in the city of New York. It shows how these people are barely getting by living in horrible conditions. The living conditions where so bad that at one point in the movie I thought to myself this can't be real theres no way human beings can live like this, but sadly some do. I would not want my dog to have to live the life that these people were living, thats how bad the conditions were. They live in shacks made from whatever they could find metal, wood, etc. They have to go through garbage just to find food. Sadly most of the people living down in the tunnel are addicted to drugs. Drugs is probably one of the main reasons why most of the people where stuck living down there. There was this one part of the documentary where Marc was filming a guy talking about his pet cats and the guy could barely even put a sentence together. The man was obviously on drugs and it just made me feel sorry for him. I don't know why that particular part of the movie stuck out at me but it did. Toward the end of the documentary the people living in the tunnel had a chose to make, they could either leave the tunnel or be forced out by Amtrak, a train company. But, in the end everyone living in the tunnel willing left because they were able to move into apartments, which were 1000 times better that what they were previously living in, that were being paid for by the government. If I were to describe this movie to a friend I would describe it as sad and depressing. This documentary really makes you feel for the homeless. It makes you want to get up and do something to try and change how homeless people live. I never really thought about just how horrible life is for homeless people until I watched this documentary. This documentary really opened my eyes to something that I had never even thought about before.