You can thank late 1980s and early 1990s New York street culture for your love of sneakers, skating, Supreme drops, and all things hip-hop. And you’ll definitely enjoy Jeremy Elkin’s feature-length documentary debut, All The Streets Are Silent, which examines this still-relevant time of American adolescent culture. Who better to chronicle that golden age of style and music than the people who lived it? For the documentary, Elkin reached out to the kids (and kids) who grew up in the scene — who better to chronicle that golden age of style and music than the people who lived it?
“All The Streets Are Silent,” which premiered today as a documentary selection at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, takes you deep into the streets of New York City, back to the days when skate culture and hip-hop were still rebellious expressions of street youth and not global commodities with rabid fan bases dominated by hype.
The film, which is narrated by Zoo York creator and Uproxx Style editor Eli Morgan Gesner, combines archive video and features prominent individuals and locations from the time period, including as Harold Hunter, Club Mars, Supreme, and DJ Stretch Armstrong, and is narrated by him. The counterculture’s biggest names are on display, but at its core, All The Streets Are Silent is a look at what it’s like to be a kid in New York City during a pivotal period in pop culture. With guests like Rosario Dawson, Darryl “DMC” McDaniels, DJ Clark Kent, the late Keith Hufnagel, and Yuki Watanabe, “All The Streets Are Silent” offers an exploration of race, society, fashion, and street culture in a culturally significant era in New York City history wrapped in a Paris is Burning meets Kids aesthetic that oozes cool.
Elkin took this project seriously, in addition to linking up with Gesner, he also tapped the legendary Large Professor, the producer that brought us Tribe Called Quest’s “Keep it Rollin” to do the soundtrack. It doesn’t get more vintage New York than that.
