new york I love you but you're bringing me down
new nyc indies / old nyc restaurants
i. new new york indies
ii. old new york restaurants
Lately, the stakes of dining out have come to bear down on me hard. Given the abundance of places to eat and drink around here, and the rising costs, I am grieved to unsound degrees when I encounter mediocrity—particularly when it’s just me and Z going out. Surely, with a little more judiciousness, we could’ve chosen a better spot? The other week, trying to find a low-key drink before and after Kate Berlant’s one-woman show swiftly devolved into a redemption quest of over 7,000 literal steps. An East Village Tiki bar was filled with non literal children brunching late into the evening and a faux dive on Eater’s list of hot! new! bars! was a gimmicky wash. They slipped us an involuntary 30% gratuity, too. Later on, game night ruined an unassuming watering hole south of Prospect Park. Such is the chance you take though, on the hunt for something new.
Over the last decade plus, my thirst for exhaustive knowledge concerning this melting-pot island has cost me the seductive designation of being a regular somewhere. A youthful lack of funds and continuous relocation (the two are intertwined) didn’t help the cause either. Before we moved, Z and I did end up steady patrons at Do or Dive and Dynaco, even with their cash-only bs. But as far as restaurants go, the closest I’ve come is Frankies 457 years ago on a boyfriend’s dime. We’d go every other month or so, alternating with Prime Meats (RIP, but the burger lives on at Franks Wine Bar), a meager frequency compared to one of my roommate’s. Her dad would drive up from Long Island and treat her to dinner there on a weekly basis.
I’m tired of the hyped-up places, name-dropped places, places shined on by TikTok or greenly recommended by 5-year transplants, and given escalating costs (inflation, supply chain issues, etc,) my restaurant mentality has become “go big or go home”— more on that another time in full. So I’m trying to return to old spots, what’s left of them anyway.
I haven’t hit up Spicy Village in a hot minute; how does their big tray chicken hold up? What about the version at Fei Long Supermarket? Is the UWS location of Charles’ Country Pan-Fried Chicken as good as the original? Is every meal still preceded by a basket of free garlic bread at Malecon? Are the pickled mustard greens at Taiwanese Pork Chop House as snappy as I remember? I’m assuming Via Carota is still everyone’s perennial favorite since there’s always a line out the door. Will Superiority Burger ever reopen?? I hope to uncover these answers soon. (**I’m also not not going to new restaurants, just being choosy about it. The pastas at Foul Witch, for example, are excellent.)
Meanwhile, to counteract the glossy nyc food-scene conundrum, I have for you a few low-budget features that reliably capture or send up the zeitgeist, and serve as brisk reminders of the unique thrills and custom defects of this city. Most of these are even shorter than the first episode of The Last of Us so there’s no excuse not to watch. Thank you, as always, for reading; now please tell me where I can get an unfussy quiet drink.
YELLING FIRE IN AN EMPTY THEATER
Justin Zuckerman, 2022
This movie aptly captures the experience of finally getting into a cool party only to learn that the artful people you thought were interesting and complex are actually kind of basic. That “cool party” is “moving to NYC.” Recent grad Lisa (Isadora Leiva) leases a room with an older couple to pursue her illustration dreams and be closer to boyfriend (Ryan Martin Brown, very funny).
The film’s humble production values, what some may call “technical inferiority”—shot on fuzzy miniDV with many necessarily tight close-ups, for less than the cost of rent the it was filmed in—emphatically contradict to its polished story-telling. Tautly scripted and disarmingly funny, Zuckerman’s debut feature keenly observes the inevitable letdown of post-grad life, slyly debunking myths and dumb expectations about “the greatest city in the world.” If you can’t make it here, maybe that’s for the better.
I started out thinking this would be a quarter-life maladjustment comedy, at the Florida naif’s expense, rife with social embarrassments, but the FSU grad proves wiser than all the fumbling idiots and NYU (or, New York University, as one character likes to reiterate) students around her. To hilarious effect, Lisa’s sunny optimism and blank credulity exposes the creative aspirants she encounters as hangers-on (see the “cinema “doctor and a novelist, self-published x3). And when varying acquaintances and friends, misreading her intentions, try to kiss her—no less than a total of five times— it’s less a triggering event and more an illustration of their witless desperation.
All of the details in the film, a parodistic mumblecore, feel like little in-jokes: the smoke breaks (also see: Actual People), fucking James Franco, the fact that Bill is a real indie musician, not just someone who looks like one. If that’s not enough, Purple Mountains closes out the credits; David Berman also knew a thing or two about self-deprecation. (72 minutes, streaming on Fandor)
PVT CHAT
Ben Hozie, 2020
Downtown-scene denizen Peter Vack, like his sister Betsey Brown (The Scary of 61st), has a fondness for explicit on-screen masturbation. In PVT Chat he serves up a rousing and unexpectedly touching performance as an online Blackjack-addict lusting after a cam girl played by Julia Fox, she of Uncut Gems and Kanye PR stunt campaigns. (Safdie bro’s regular Buddy Duress shows up, too.) Somewhere between the screen-modulated licking of cigarette butts and shoe bottoms, the unlikely pair get to know each other, the salacious setup blooming into something like romance. Should you desire to watch a Dimes-Square-scene-Ion-Pack-adjacent movie, you might consider this one. A degenerate charm wafts through this When Harry Met Sally for the OnlyFans generation. To the socially inhibited puritans, you’ve been forewarned. (86 minutes, streaming on Mubi)
PROJECT SPACE 13
Michael M. Bilandic, 2021
The catch-22 of many satires and take-downs of the art world is they tend to be as pretentious and cavalier as their subjects (Ruben Ostland’s The Square, bigtime). Not so with Project Space 13, set against the pandemic lockdown and BLM protests. The dialogue is conversationally accessible, spiked with quotidian yet hyper-specific cultural references (horrorcore, the Apple Genius Bar, Richard Jewel) and endlessly quotable rejoinders, less so for their witty sophistication than how they reek of the insipid now.
Outfitted like a prepper-cum-fuccboi in an orange hoodie and fur trapper hat, Nate (Keith Poulson), has locked himself in a metal cage for 120 days as part of his Soho opening. Ruining his debut though is the COVID lockdown and downtown lootings. To protect his investment, the gallery owner (Jason Grisell), dressed in what resembles a vest made of Glossier pink bubble pouches, dispatches a pair of private security guards: a young college student (Hunter Zimny) and a Gulf-War veteran/COVID-skeptic (Theodore Bouloukis).
During the course of their moronically brilliant banter, each reveals his own juvenile intelligence, not least of all le artiste. The smartest “person” in the room might be Zebos, a small robot who feeds Nate a pre-scheduled diet of bugs and soy beverages and dominates him with taser shocks, showing the artist “whose work truly dwells at the intersection of art and technology” who’s the boss. (66 minutes, streaming on Mubi)
I WANT MORE, I WANT LESS
Bryce Richardson, 2019
It feels a bit disingenuous including this low-key gem since it’s nowhere to be found, but I think about it time to time and it’s worth noting, in case one of the streaming services picks it up down the road.
Unlike the other films outlined here, I Want More, I Want Less doesn’t trade in the creative milieu or managerial class but falls under a subtheme that I refer to as “how to make it in America.” This down-to-earth chamber drama about a self-employed accountant (Gabby Girma) and the cellphone technician (Sam Abass) she rents part of her office to recognizes the constraints of the American dream and the compulsory opportunism it can inspire. The movie, backdropped by rdinary brick facades of gentrifying Queens and Greenpoint and a house-lite score, crests in a walloping act of fresh devastation, but ascribes no judgements. Any bad feelings don’t last—they can’t. In this city, you keep moving. (87 minutes, streaming ???)
MOST BEAUTIFUL ISLAND
Ana Asensio, 2016
This is an older title, a SXSW competition winner that took me by surprise when I saw and wrote about it it a few years ago.
Here’s the premise, excerpted from Mubi: “Lensed in a dreamy Super16, it secretes a dread and grit noticeably absent in today's anodyne New York and New York-set films. Filmmaker Ana Asensio pulls double duty acting as an undocumented worker deadened to her daily drudgery: hawking restaurant fliers, changing clothes in public spaces, stiffing a cab. Short on rent, she gratefully accepts an offer from her friend to work a party, and ends up standing around a chalk-numbered circle in a concrete Chelsea basement with ten other non-American beauties. What awaits them is pretty impossible to guess. **Or at least was 7 years ago. Don’t worry; this is thriller, not a horror movie. (80 minutes, streaming gratis on Tubi, Freevie, and others)
CELEBRATED PLACES I RECENTLY REVISITED AND STILL ENJOYED
Don’t even get me started on pizza.
A.A. Bake & Doubles: add chutney and extra pepper sauce
John’s on Bleecker Street: the blistered crust is no sourdough, brittle as soon as it hits room temperature. and they will shower you with incredulity should you ask for a reservation.
Little Pepper: scallion fried rice!!!
Los Tacos No. 1: in Tribeca though; I wouldn’t be caught dead in Chelsea Market
Locanda Vini for steak and tartufo pasta
Malatesta’s pasta, too
Nyonya: you can have an excellent meal for two under $40. Cash only
The Odeon, always
Peaches Hothouse: no frills Nashville hot chicken
Persepolis: rice with dill and fava beens preferred
Raoul’s au poivre burger
Le Rivage’s French onion soup burger
Scarr’s: I’ll never wait for a table at Lucali or bother anymore with Prince Street, but I will stand on line for a slice here.
Tasty Handpulled Noodles: Knife cut, stir-fried noodles ONLY!
Where should I go next? My inbox is always open for suggestions.
It may just be winter talking but I've felt less of a desire the past couple months to constantly check out new restaurants in favor of re-visiting favorite places. That said, I went to Rosella for the first time last month and very much enjoyed it, especially their wine selections.
My go-to cocktail bar is The Rockwell Place, down the street from the BAM. Same owners as Long Island Bar, wonderful drinks, and there's always a table or bar seat available.
The older I get the more it's "The Odeon, always"