Big Apple’s Littlest Bites: Coming of Age on Film in NYC

The story of five black and Latino teenagers from Harlem whose lives were upended by a miscarriage of justice after they were arrested in 1989 and convicted of rape.

16mm black-and-white footage shot by Manfred Kirchheimer and Walter Hess in New York between 1958 and 1960, and 16mm color film from St. Clair Bourne in 1971, evoke different rhythms of life.

Spike Lee gets semi-autobiographical in this singular 1994 film about family life in 1973 Bed-Stuy, depicting hopes, conflicts, and losses in a close-knit neighborhood populated by memorable characters.

A Brooklyn teenager dreams of escaping life in the projects to go to college and eventually become a doctor, until things go awry when she meets a cute dude with a Jeep.

In this taut suspense thriller directed by Hitchcock protégé Ted Tetzlaff, a boy who always lies witnesses a murder, but can't get anyone to believe him—except for the killers.

One of two experimental films directed by Japanese conceptual artist and architect Shūsaku Arakawa, For Example (A Critique of Never) closely follows an unhoused boy as he wanders the streets of New York City.

An upper-class 12-year-old makes a slightly older, working class friend, who teaches her about pastimes like makeup and shoplifting, in a film about bonds between young people across class lines.

Director Woodie King Jr. portrays a young boy living in Harlem, who wanders the streets of the city one night, trying to earn the $27 he owes his mother while pondering what led to his father’s disappearance.

Mameet, a 17-year-old Pakistani living in Queens, lashes out after his basketball-star brother is killed in a robbery at the family store—a situation that grows more dangerous when he picks up a gun.

Four Harlem friends spend their days skipping school, getting in fights, and casually shoplifting, until conflicting views of the future lead them toward an inescapable path of escalating violence.

In Robert M. Young’s funny, sensitive depiction of divorce, two 12-year-olds deal with their parents’ changing circumstances amid their own adolescent growing pains and sexual awakening.

Short films made between 1961 and 2023 highlight the rich diversity of people, communities, neighborhoods, joys and challenges that inform growing up in New York City.

Gordon Parks Jr. (Super Fly) puts a modern urban spin on Romeo and Juliet in this 1975 drama about Black and Puerto Rican teens in Harlem.

Noah Baumbach scores a triumph with a coming-of-age story about a teenager whose writer parents are divorcing, exploring the gulf between sexes, generations, art and commerce, and Brooklyn and Manhattan.

In the high-pressure cauldron of New York City, talented students at the High School for the Performing Arts strive to escape poverty, perfect their art, find success, and achieve the ultimate goal: fame.