The Street: A Film with the Homeless (1997)

The Street: A Film with the Homeless is a 78-minute 1997 documentary film about the Canadian homeless in Montreal. The film was directed by Daniel Cross and produced by him and Don Haig. The production houses were the National Film Board of Canada and Necessary Illusions Productions Inc.

Made over 6 years, "The Street" is the result of the filmmakers' total immersion into the world of the homeless. It is a gutsy, raw, violent, sad, sexy, moving and intimate study of 3 homeless Montrealers who can be seen mostly near the city's Guy-Concordia metro (subway) station of Société de transport de Montréal (STM).

The unique approach of the camera is neither voyeuristic nor judgmental. Characters experience cycles of addiction and recovery, hope and despair - but rise above the street with a sense of dignity, humanity and community. Set in a context which sees our civil society disintegrating and the safety-net collapsing, "The Street" gets deep inside a very complex social issue, beyond mediated stereotypes.



^ Synopsis on EyeSteelFilm website

^ Documentary Edication Resources (DER) site about the movie

Synopsis

For six years, director Daniel Cross followed the lives of brothers Danny and John Claven and Frank O'Malley—three homeless men who spent much of their time in and around a Montreal subway station. Cross became intimately involved with the three men's lives, chronicling the evolution of their years on the street, and their cycles of addiction and recovery, hope and despair. The Street was filmed in a cinema verité style. The Street was the winner of a Special Jury Award for Documentaries at the Vancouver International Film Festival in 1996 and the People's Choice Award at the 1997 Canadian International Documentary Film Awards in Toronto