Near Penn Station, next to the Amtrak tracks, squatters have been living for years. Marc Singer goes underground to live with them, and films this “family.” A dozen or so men and one woman talk about their lives: horrors of childhood, jail time, losing children, being coke-heads. They scavenge, they’ve built themselves sturdy one-room shacks; they have pets, cook, chat, argue, give each other haircuts. A bucket is their toilet. Leaky overhead pipes are a source of water for showers. They live in virtual darkness. During the filming, Amtrak gives a 30-day eviction notice.

Dark Days (2000)
  • Rating: (3,167 votes)
  • Runtime:94 minutes
  • Director: Marc Singer
  • Country:USA
  • Actor:
    Himself
    Marc Singer
  • Genre:Documentary
  • Producers:
    Giancarlo Bonati
    associate producer  
    Scott Bradley
    associate producer  
    Ben Freedman
    co-producer  
    Rick Giles
    associate producer  
    Christopher Griffith
    associate producer  
    Avra Jain
    associate producer  
    Mette Jensen
    associate producer  
    Randall Mesdon
    executive producer  
    Gordon Paul
    executive producer  
    Paolo Seganti
    executive producer  
    Marc Singer
    producer  
    Charlotte Stockdale
    associate producer  
    Morton Swinsky
    executive producer  
    David Wike
    associate producer  
    David Wike
    associate producer  
  • Plot: Near Penn Station, next to the Amtrak tracks, squatters have been living for years. Marc Singer goes underground to live with them, and films this "family." A dozen or so men and one woman talk about their lives: horrors of childhood, jail time, losing children, being coke-heads. They scavenge, they've built themselves sturdy one-room shacks; they have pets, cook, chat, argue, give each other haircuts. A bucket is their toilet. Leaky overhead pipes are a source of water for showers. They live in virtual darkness. During the filming, Amtrak gives a 30-day eviction notice. Written by <jhailey@hotmail.com>
Dark Days
  • User's comment:fascinating film with a remarkable story behind it by utzutzutz

    It's nigh-impossible not to be moved by Marc Singer's remarkable first film, about a community of homeless people living in a train tunnel beneath Manhattan. What's even more inspiring is how the film got made. Then-20-year-old Singer, who'd never before run a camera, lived underground with his subjects, recruited them as crew, convinced local merchants to donate equipment and even sold his own bed to buy film. His original goal in making the film was to fund its denizens' move out of the tunnel. The result is a fascinating slice of a part of life most of us have never considered. The characters are gritty, sometimes funny, sometimes tragic and always very real. Dark Days takes homelessness out of the realm of sociological phenomenon and into an almost-visceral engagement with these people and their lives. We look in as the characters decorate their scrap-metal shacks with discarded material, earn their livings, emotionally support each other and ultimately struggle with their homes' demise. Though clearly Singer roots for his subjects, he avoids the temptation to pity them; he simply calls it as he sees it - and has lived it. There's even a happy ending.


  • Also known as: Imeres sto skotadi (Greece - festival title),

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