- A Feature Documentary Film, Conceived, Produced, Directed, Photographed, Audio Recorded, Edited, by Phil Gries based on his observations as an elementary school teacher in Harlem, New York (1967-1970).
- HARLEM SCHOOL 1970, a documentary feature film, reveals a conventional 'day in the life' of inner city elementary school C.S. 30 during its first school year of operation (Sept. 1969 - June 1970). Without the use of narration or interviews the film explores an historic journey back in time, allowing the viewer access, visually and audibly, to experience a variety of daily structured & unstructured activities related to classroom time, lunch and recess. Viewers hear and witness the rhymes / songs that children sing, their games, colloquial language, conflicts, and the many challenges they encounter during an uncertain exploratory time in their lives.
Filmed in he spring of 1970 in 16mm black & white using a spring wound Bolex camera and a concealed audio recorder, cinematographer Phil Gries, reveals a world of innocence which is universal...children's instinctive behavior during calm moments and intense moments when learning, playing and interacting with their peers and teachers in, at times, a challenging environment.
The magic of what is innocently revealed to an "invisible" camera, by all whom are filmed, effects a "feeling of being there" heightening the reality of what we are seeing and hearing. The technique of direct cinema allows the viewer to feel that he/she is a part of this world, in Harlem New York, at a time when life was very much different than today, and also not so different.
Never before released to the public, almost a half century since it was conceived, produced, directed, photographed, sound recorded and edited by Phil Gries, a surviving original print has been discovered, digitized, slightly re-edited, and completely restored for presentation. In retrospect no other similar attempt has ever been completed, filming "a day in the life" of an inner city elementary school prior to 1993.
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