Michael Galinsky, Suki Hawley, and David Beilinson, the makers of "Battle of Brooklyn," a documentary about the controversial Atlantic Yards project, screened a rough cut of their film last night at the American Law Institute-American Bar Association's eminent domain law conference. It's an inside look at one property owner at the business end of eminent domain.
This morning, I had a chance to sit down briefly with Michael in the lobby of the Hyatt Coral Gables and talk about what brought this film about.
(24 minutes)Stream the podcast above, or download it here (33mb mp3).
Here's a summary of "Battle of Brooklyn" --
The film is the only intimate look at the very public and passionate fight waged by owners and residents facing condemnation of their property to make way for the controversial Atlantic Yards Project, a massive plan to build 16 skyscrapers and a basketball arena for the New Jersey Nets in the heart of Brooklyn. Shot over seven years and compiled from almost 500 hours of footage, Battle of Brooklyn is an epic tale of hw far people will go to fight for what they believe in.
Daniel Goldstein's apartment sits at what would be center court of the new arena. He is dragged into the fight because he simply can't believe that the government should use the power of Eminent Domain to take his property and hand it off to a private developer. He and others form a community activist group to develop alternative plans to the proposal and to expose misconceptions about the project in the media. Going up against the largest publicly traded real estate developer in the U.S., a mayor, and Russian oligarch (all billionaires), he wages an all out battle top stop the project takes his case to the State's highest court of law.
We'll post a review soon.
