Entry N°18.3: Film "Class Divide"

“Class Divide,” a fascinating documentary by Marc Levin and Daphne Pinkerson, focuses on a macrocosm and a microcosm, both within the urban sprawl of New York City. The macrocosm is the slice of Manhattan known as West Chelsea, which in the last decade has seen a real estate boom spurred in part by the success of the innovative urban park known as the High Line.

The microcosm is the intersection of 10th Avenue and 26th Street, where one of the most elite and pricey K-12 schools in the city faces a housing project that contains some of Manhattan’s poorest families, whose kids attend public or parochial schools. While the film contains interviews with all sorts of adults involved with the locations it concerns, some of its most illuminating comments come from kids on the two sides of 10th Avenue, who reflect on their circumstances and the fortunes life has given them.