FILM - "Kill the Poor"

Kill the Poor is an excellent suspense movie with social substance and a great flair for 1982 New York style. The film begins with an act of meticulous arson meant to help convince a long-term squatter to move out; it then spins through a variety of short scenes set mostly before the fire that show the motives for any one of the tenants. While a fragmented narrative could be confusing, especially one spliced so roughly (scenes frequently interrupt one another), director Alan Taylor handles the work with ease. He seems intimately familiar with the characters (his TV experience) and enamored with the Lower East Side’s naughty-but-nice atmosphere (his HBO experience). As for his screenplay, it comes from Daniel “I’m Not Lemony Snicket” Handler, whose varied experience with storytelling comes into play. It at least explains the dark humor, levity which, along with the freewheeling pace, keeps the film from being melodramatic.

While Kill the Poor is too distracted by its characters to make the statement of similarly themed films (like In America), the characters themselves keep the film alive. Though the narrator, played by David Krumholtz, is unconvincing (a tough guy in a frail body), the other characters are a lively bunch. (For instance: Delilah, the colorful gay tenant; Negrito, the local Latin tough guy; Spike, the young, hip black artist; and Butch, a student writing a dissertation on their living situation.) None of them get enough face time to be fleshed out, but their interactions are as real as anything you might see on TV’s The Wire. The person we do wind up caring for is Carlos, the squatter that all the other tenants have banded together to evict. Carlos becomes a representative of the old blood being pushed out by the newly rich, and Paul Calderon plays him so straight that our empathy for him comes mixed with fear. Taylor is evenhanded with his presentation: each new scene makes us view the characters in a new light.

There are still a few weaknesses in the screenplay, most likely leftover adaptations from Joel Rose’s novel. Joe Peltz, our semi-hero, gets married at the beginning of the film to help a French woman better her circumstances­—they wind up falling for each other, but we never find out why. They suddenly have a baby, and their history is dismissed. Though the film eventually circles back to explain the circumstances of the birth, there’s a lot left unsaid—which is fine for the film. Focus is a good thing, and stretching the narrative any further would break the fragile balance between plot and character.

Kill the Poor may not be the most provocative film, but it manages to be a very evocative one, conjuring up the feel of a dangerous urban neighborhood and illustrating the ties that band a community together. It’s a deft work by director and writer, and well worth watching for anybody looking for a less moody Scorsese.