In Jackson Heights

Wiseman’s 40th feature documentary is about Jackson Heights, Queens, one of New York City’s liveliest and most culturally diverse neighborhoods, a thriving and endlessly changing crossroad of styles, cuisines, and languages, that is—like vast portions of our city—caught in the gears of economic “development.” Wiseman’s mastery is as total as it is transparent: his film moves without apparent effort among an LGBTQ support meeting, a musical street performance,a gathering of Holocaust survivors, a hilarious training class for aspiring taxi drivers, an ace eyebrow-removal specialist at work, the annual Gay Pride parade, a meeting of local businessmen in a beauty parlor, and a meeting of undocumented individuals facing deportation. Wiseman catches the textures of New York life in 2015, the music of our speech, and a vast, emotionally complex, dynamic tapestry is woven before our eyes. An NYFF53 selection.