Quote :

"Once the fourth-largest metropolis in America—some have called it the Death of the American Dream. Today, the young people of the Motor City are making it their own DIY paradise where rules are second to passion and creativity. They are creating the new Detroit on their own terms, against real adversity. We put our boots on and went exploring"

Quote :

"Detroit's usually portrayed as a crime-ridden city blighted by urban decay and corruption. That's true. But it's not the whole story, not by a long shot. Detroit Lives shows the Motor City as it is: a diamond amidst the rough. Grin and bear the occasional conspicuous shot of boots from the movie's sponsors, but this 32 minute flick is about as fair and accurate a vibe about the city as you can get. Sure, there are bad parts and they make for great ruin porn, but you get used to those, you look past them and go deeper. Scratch the surface and it's far more interesting, engaging, artistic and creative that you could ever imagine. It's like the wild west for people who want to do things without the man breathing down their necks. If you've got the time to watch the three-part documentary plus bonus, you should, it'll give you a better feel for what's really going on in Detroit."

http://www.palladiumboots.com/video/detroit-lives#part1


Absolutely LOVED this. It's a nice change of pace from the usual stuff you see about Detroit.
Thought Knoxville did a great job. It's nice to see him do something semi serious where he isn't being a total idiot.

Anyone else see this? Thoughts?

[Edited on March 3, 2012 at 8:07 PM. Reason : .]

3/3/2012 8:03:34 PM

any place i can watch it for free?

3/3/2012 8:24:13 PM

Yeah the link posted below the picture.

3/3/2012 8:25:40 PM

ah

3/3/2012 8:45:28 PM

There are 3 parts. The other two are listed under the video on that page.

3/3/2012 10:37:54 PM

I watched it, and it does a good job of highlighting some of the pockets of hipsterdom in the city. People do have raves in abandoned buildings and such. One thing it's right about is that the people here are actually really nice, way nicer than your stereotypical big city Northeastern people (NY, Boston, Jersey, etc) for example.

I've been living in the area for a couple months. I've wanted to actually move into Detroit proper but as someone who doesn't have a lot of connections, it's hard to figure what could be a decent place. Right now the city is mostly low income people. Part of that is because there are poor city services and high taxes (2.5% income tax).

The documentary definitely showed the cool parts and the "ruin porn," but I don't think it fully conveyed the emptiness in a lot of neighborhoods. They're just not going to be filled with people any time soon. Lots of this shit needs to be torn down and non-Hipster middle class people need to have a quality-of-life incentive to move back in to a core area of the city.

3/3/2012 11:17:26 PM

just watched it, pretty interesting, makes me want to visit just to check it out since i've never been there

3/4/2012 12:14:42 AM

Ah the confusion of written English

Is this Lives as in "Once a middle class citizen in the auto industry, John now lives in poverty"

Or is it Lives as in "We're in the middle of downtown Detroit! Run for your lives!"

3/4/2012 2:05:47 AM

its basically just "Detroit: not as shitty as you might have thought from media stereotypes"

3/4/2012 2:48:40 AM

I will say this... the ruined big buildings are actually really cool, and the documentary conveys that. They could actually be cleaned up and preserved to be used as proper tourist destinations. It's the spread out, empty neighborhoods and very poorly maintained streets (in terms of the actual pavement) that bring this city down. Knoxville's hosts cherry picked neighborhoods for sure--you have to know exactly where to go. If you drive around a lot of the main roads you will not see any of that. You will see neighborhoods where half the houses are abandoned in various states of disrepair, and half the lots are empty due to demolition.

3/4/2012 8:22:00 AM

Quote :

"About 5 years ago, I saw white girls running down the street. Now, in the past, everybody would call 911 like "Who's chasing them?" So I realized that they were jogging."

3/4/2012 9:08:07 AM

haha that was awesome

3/4/2012 12:09:16 PM

So not only is Detroit full of urban blight, it's also full of hipsters.

Awesome.

3/4/2012 5:57:29 PM