Dark Days Documentary

                After watching the documentary, “Dark Days,” I have a new light on the subject of homeless people. Compared to the other documentaries we have watched in class, I actually enjoyed the length because it gave time for each of the characters to develop their story and the audience was able to connect with them more. Unlike the other documentaries it gave the audience time to fully understand each character and it wasn’t just cut off with unanswered questions.

 It was very interesting to hear each of their stories and see how they each became homeless. It’s crazy to think that more than 80% of them were crack addicts. Many had husbands or wives that had kicked them out of their home. Many of the characters also had children that they left, or never got to meet because they had been in jail. One man explains that he was in jail when his daughter was born, and then was released, but by the time she left the hospital, he was back in jail. When his daughter was 5 years old, she was raped, her arm and leg were cut off and she was badly burned. My heart just breaks for these children that have no control over their parents and the environment that they are brought into the world in. These homeless people have created their own community together. Many of them have been living in the tunnel for years. So when the police came and ordered them to leave, they had nowhere to go. They had been living there so long, that that was home to them, and they didn’t know anything else.

I noticed that when the director would be filming the documentary and a train would pass he didn’t cut that out. He left if to remind the audience of where these homeless people were living and that it was literally right next to an active train track. He also added some shots of the rats that lived amongst the homeless people. These different shots add a lot to the film. The many different kinds of shots that the director uses, makes the film more interesting. If there were just shots of the different characters being interviewed or occasionally in their home, it would get boring and just repetitive. But adding all of the shots of the train, and different shots of their community down there, gives the audience the ability to experience it and fully understand what they are going through.

This film was shot in black and white to add to effect to the documentary. If it was done in color, I feel it would change the whole mood; it feeds off of the title, “Dark Days.” The black and white coloring gives it a depressing and gloomy feeling. It adds to the darkness of living in the tunnel with the rats and disease that goes along with it. Music also adds a lot to this film. At the end when they are all tearing down their homes, music adds more emphasis of the fact that they are moving on with their life and they have a new beginning.