Superfluous people

A grim and unremitting survey of New York citizens exiled at the margins of capitalist society including the elderly displaced by new housing construction; a woman on relief whose husband was recently released from a mental institution; and those who live in the slums of New York. A document of its time, the film describes the challenge confronting the progressive social aspirations of the Kennedy era. Tough, touching and uncompromising, this is a fascinating documentary with some acute insights into contemporary civilisation.