Peopling of New York City, Spring 2012

Hello, my fellow classmates! Hope all is well. Today I would like to discuss the movie The Landlord (1970) directed and produced by Hal Ashby and Norman Jewison, respectively and the concept of gentrification. First, I would like to talk about The Landlord. I thought that this movie was interesting because Elgar (Beau Bridges), the ‘white’ protagonist in the film, went against his affluent family for an African woman. Even during this time period, a white man falling in love with an African woman was a big thing for some people. However, Elgar’s obstinate and rebellious nature caused him to go against his parents. Consequently, Elgar went to live with Lanie (Marki Bey), his African American girlfriend. In addition, I was surprised when Elgar had a fair with Francine (Diana Sands), despite being in a relationship with Lanie. In fact, Elgar and Francine even had an illegitimate child together! Even worse was Francine had this affair with Elgar in spite of being married to Copee (Louis Gossett Jr.) Talk about cuckoldry! I also enjoyed the film’s humorous moments, but was astonished to see that small kid smoking while he was in Elgar’s car.

Next, I would like to jump to the topic of gentrification and how it is related to this film. As defined by the 1980 American Oxford Dictionary in the Gentrification of Harlem? (Schaffer and Smith), gentrification is “the movement of middle class families into urban areas causing property values to increase and having the secondary effect of driving out poorer families.” While watching the film, I really did not see The Landlord as a film about neighborhood change. Others may have seen it that way, but I did not get a sense of much change occurring in the neighborhood while viewing this film. All I noticed was Elgar’s affair with two African women and his failure to comply with his parent’s wishes. I feel that the movie superficially portrayed the concept of gentrification because there were more other random events going on in the film that had nothing to do with gentrification. For example, Elgar was supposed to evict all the people in the tenement he was the landlord of, but he did not because he grew fond of the low-income African Americans that resided there. This illustrates that Elgar did not embody the ‘spirit of gentrification’ because he appreciated the Africans that lived in the tenement of Park Slope, Brooklyn. While Elgar’s parents were more critical of African Americans and more racist toward them, we see that Elgar grows close to these African people (as seen in the scene with the party) and even has a child with one. Essentially, Elgar’s actions contradicted the very definition given of gentrification above. I mean did Elgar’s moving in cause any of the poorer individuals to move out? No. I thought that if Elgar did indeed remove the occupants of the tenant, then the film would better depict the idea of gentrification.

Also, I found the article that dealt with Gentrification in Harlem? to be of much statistical significance. I say this because according to the article, central Harlem’s population consisted of 96.1% African Americans. Since most of the African population in central Harlem was financially unstable, the gentrification of whites into that neighborhood would make matters even worse for them. For instance, if more whites moved into Harlem, the values of property would increase and it would thus be more difficult for the poorer side of the population to keep up with the high rent in tenements. Fortunately for the occupants living in Elgar’s tenement, this was not the case because Elgar did not evict them and even entitled the role of landlord to the family there.

Finally, I want to add a few comments on the film’s lighting and costumes. The extravagant and stylish outfits worn by Elgar’s family and the ragged clothes of the people in the tenement provided a clear juxtaposition between the different social classes of the neighborhood (rich and poor, for example). Also, the few scenes with the brilliant lighting demonstrate even further the distinction between the different groups that lived in the neighborhood (the middle-class vs. the poor Africans). Overall, I felt that the film could have directed more of its attention toward class distinctions and gentrification, rather than Elgar’s love affairs with two African women he happened to meet.

First and foremost, I would like to complement the films construction of the character Elgar Winthrop (Beau Bridges). Winthrop has a certain likability factor that works for him throughout the movie. His genuine interest in the residents of the tenement immediately wins us, the audience, over and we side with him over his family. However, at one junction of the film I was rooting for a tragic event to devastate Winthrop. His sexual actions endangered his ‘likability factor’  and though being murdered with an axe is far too gruesome, I was hoping for something along those lines to happen…until he ‘did the right thing’ and took custody of his baby.

However, I would not like to focus on Winthrop doing, or not doing the right thing, but rather shift my attention to the film as a whole. The setting of the film positions Park Slope to undergo a change. However, quite the opposite happens. Soon, Elgar no longer wants to convert the building into a stylish flat; instead he opts to help the residents. Though it was challenging in gaining acceptance from everyone, this “runaway” from home gradually fixes up the place to an extent.

With the original idea of transforming the tenement into a high-end flat gone, the film takes on another position – one of gentrification. If Elgar did continue to pursue his interests, then the movie might have been seen as the ‘typical’ idea of the white man winning against the black. However, it doesn’t and this is what is essential to the movie. There is no gentrification. Yes part of the tenement is restored but there is no ‘displacement of low-income residents,’ as put by Princeton.edu. This influences the context of the film immensely. It shows that the white and black man can get along which was a question posed to us last week with the ending of Do the Right Thing.

Lastly, Edgar does embody the spirit of what gentrification should be. Gentrifying essentially means putting the lower class into an ever lower class. There are multiple reasons this is wrong, the primary being the relocation of residents. Instead, Edgar goes against this definition. He looks to solve the problems of the people and diverts his efforts into the Park Slope community, taking on a higher role than being the landlord.

On the surface, The Landlord (1970) seems like a film about gentrification, and the converting of a poor neighborhood into something better. As the film begins, we see Elgar, the white, upper class aristocrat (who totally reminds me of the rich white kids I went to high school with…nostalgia) and hear of his plans to change a neighborhood and make it successful. He comes into Park Slope in a white suit, white car, and a naïve outlook on life, totally looking like “the landlord.” This gave me the original impression that he would be a domineering, controlling presence in the neighborhood. But as the film progresses, we see less gentrification, and more personal change and racial interaction. We see vastly different situations in the rich, upper class white scenes, and the poor, black neighborhood scenes, and how Elgar (Beau Bridges) struggles to find a balance between the two. The film shows him and his maturation at the age of 29, realizing who he was, rather than being a product of his parents’ success. We see how he adjusts to living in the mostly black neighborhood, and how he interacts in a completely different situation. This is definitely characterized in his romances/flings with Lanie and Fanny. He directly rebels against his mother’s intentions and continues his relationship. He also supports the neighborhood and its people when arguing with his parents, which shows Elgar’s growing independence.

I didn’t really feel like The Landlord showed neighborhood change. As mentioned previously, it shows and individual change. Elgar basically assimilated and became a part of the neighborhood, racially, romantically, and socially. The neighborhood didn’t change; he did. There are some scenes that show individual change, rather than neighborhood change. I also feel that it was more of a change in racial attitudes, rather than the change in the neighborhood as a whole. For example, the scene with Fanny’s boyfriend and the axe felt racially driven to me. For the predominantly black neighborhood, I thought that people had to adjust to and learn that “the rich white man” was not trying to oppress them or ruin their neighborhood; he was trying to cooperate and make things work.

Regarding gentrification, I don’t think Elgar shows or embodies it at all throughout the film. His original plans set out on doing so, but his actions in the movie contradicted his intentions. By definition, gentrification is “movement of middle class families into urban areas causing property values to increase and having the secondary effect of driving out poorer families.” By this definition, I don’t feel like Elgar did anything in the film to follow that standard. He wanted to set up a house for himself, which he did. But did he drive out the poorer families? He definitely did not. Did he move other families in as well? Nope. It was more about the individual changing, rather than a drastic change. The neighborhood, its residents, and the “gentrifier” (Elgar) would not really work in improving and gentrifying the mostly black neighborhood. The tenants would be unwilling to accept the changes and work to change their situation. I think that the people of the neighborhood were complacent with their area. By gentrifying and changing Park Slope in that particular situation, it would not have been successful. If Elgar were portrayed as more cold and ruthless, rather than sympathetic and open, he would have definitely been more of a symbol for gentrification. However, the film showed his assimilation into the neighborhood, rather than the gentrification of it.

BTW. The poster for this movie is totally and ridiculously sexual. Ew.

For me, the Landlord showed more about white and black segregation/integration rather than neighborhood change or gentrification. There were many scenes throughout the film that emphasized the differences between the white and black people. For example, the beginning of the film starts with Elgar lying down peacefully on his lawn at his suburban home, which is contrasted with the hectic, busy streets of the black neighborhood (Park Slope?). Also, the awkward dinner in Elgar’s family is contrasted with the scene with dancing black women, where Elgar meets Lanie. Elgar is unprejudiced concerning blacks, unlike his conservative family. He actually seems to enjoy spending time in his new home in the black neighborhood and wants them to like him back. Also, one of my favorite scenes was when Joyce comes to the tenant and meets Marge. In this scene, Joyce does not keep her normal composure but allows herself to forget about their skin colors and her prejudices for a few hours and enjoy spending time with Marge. Elgar and Joyce show that integration is possible when you stop caring about skin colors.

As for gentrification, I believe that Elgar does not embody the spirit of gentrification. In our reading, it mentioned that Harlem was an attractive, but difficult target for gentrification. The land was cheap and a relatively big portion of the houses were abandoned and/or owned by the government. It was a similar case for the Brooklyn Park Slope tenant that Elgar buys. In the neighborhood, there are big plots of abandoned land that are occupied by remains of former houses and piles of wood and junk. It would be an ideal place to construct better houses and rent them out for more money. However, the neighborhood was almost completely black and these working-class blacks would be the neighborhood’s only gentrifiers. Furthermore, whites were not very willing to gentrify the place because, as the reading suggested, they felt that the neighborhood was threatening. I believe Elgar picked a good place to gentrify, but his plans became of less importance to him than black women or getting along with his new neighbors. Furthermore, I believe the film portrayed gentrification as improbable and stupid in such a neighborhood. For example, Elgar talks of planning to hang a chandelier on the ceiling, which seems ridiculous in such a small, murky building. And Lanie gives Elgar a skeptical look as he talks of putting a statue or bird bath in the disheveled backyard. Moreover, even if Elgar built such a nice place in the tenant, there would be few black people who would be able to, or white people who would be willing to live in it.

Why is my title “gentrification” backwards? There are three reasons:

[1] It is a hobby of mine to write/say words backwards, ex. my name Miharbe!

[2] I am strange.

[3] Elgar starts the film as a gentrifier but does a total 180 as he becomes assimilated to Park Slope and the tenements grow on him.

The film The Landlord can be interpreted as a tale of gentrification, especially when one analyzes it today. It is incredible to see images of Park Slope then and compare it now, oh how much things have changed!

Elgar is suffering what todays twitter invested culture would tweet “#richwhiteboyproblems.” Oh look he’s trending! ^_^ But in all seriousness, Elgar tries to escape the suffocating hold of his rich, overbearing, dogmatic family at the ripe age of 29. Like a Spanish conquistador he gallops drives into unchartered (by white men/women) lands with the intention of kicking out all the black folk and make a hip and cool bachelor pad. Word. He does have a rough start moving in especially when he faces that intimidating 8-year-old smoking karate kid. But he eventually settles there. However, as the film progresses, Elgar loses his zeal for gentrification and assimilates into the building. In fact, he defends the tenements and their lifestyle to both of his parents. This is where I think the whole Elgar being a symbol of gentrification hits a little snag.

The film is very interesting to analyze visually. Lighting plays a key role in this film. The lighting in all the scenes with Elgar’s family is very bright, coupled by their bright clothing. Conversely, the shots of Park Slope are very dark and grimy. Shadows were cast on a lot of the characters faces. Moreover, the scene between Marge and Joyce has an interesting use of shot reverse shot between the characters. I think this is a brilliant editing choice that showcases the scene of two women of different backgrounds, different races, representing the two different worlds of the film, and how they interact with one another. The use of parallel editing was also interesting in the later scene between Copee and Francine and Elgar. By cross-cutting these two scenes the audience connects these characters together, now if Elgar was really after gentrification he wouldn’t be forming such connections and relationships.

If we use the word “gentrification” to refer to the changes that occur when the “gentry” – wealthy (white) people – acquire or rent property in low income and working class neighborhoods, then we should have no problem saying that – at least, initially – twenty-nine-year-old Elgar Enders (Beau Bridges) embodies the spirit of gentrification in The Landlord (1970). After all, he is a young, white male from a rich family (which lives in a completely whitewashed world), and he decides to buy a tenement in “the ghetto” (a world comprised of various shades of brown) for the sole purpose of evicting all of its occupants, knocking it down, and building himself a luxury home. He has that part of the definition of gentrification down.

However, things become a little murky when Elgar actually begins to live in Park Slope. He spends more and more time there and less and less time at his parents’ whitewashed estate. And the more time he spends with Marge (Pearl Bailey), Fanny (Diana Sands), and the other residents (and the less with his racist parents), the further he seems to depart from his initial plans to convert the tenement, and the more integrated he becomes into the black community of Park Slope. By the end of the film, he seems to have become fully immersed in the black community – he has traded his luxury home for a cramped tenement apartment, his starched white clothing for a loose and earth tone wardrobe, and his racist mother and father for a black girlfriend and child. Elgar Enders is changed, but he has failed to implement any of the changes that are meant to accompany gentrification.

And while others may think this means he failed to live up to being the embodiment of the spirit of gentrification, I am not so sure that is the case. He is one person. He may not have been able to implement the changes he wanted to, but others may hear about how a white man is living among the “natives.” These people might be attracted to the idea and may wish to experience a similar immersion, thus prompting them to move into the neighborhood as well. And at the same time as this group of people is moving into the neighborhood for its culture, another section of people may move in because it is the “hip” thing to do. These people may start buying up property and building up new apartment complexes, expensive boutiques, and fancy restaurants – thus, drawing in even more people with money and nothing better to spend it on – until yuppies and hipsters outnumber the natives.

It has happened in Alphabet City and many other neighborhoods throughout New York. Who is to say Park Slope was any different? Gentrification is a gradual process and it is not only one person who brings about all of the changes within a neighborhood that is undergoing the process. It requires time and people who have a reason to want to be in that neighborhood – whether as an investment opportunity or as a chance to experience a different culture – and the money to make their dreams come true. A person like Elgar Enders would simply be the catalyst that set the entire process into motion.

The Landlord(1970) is a movie about Elgar, who runs away from home and invests in real estate. The movie, in my opinion, does not focus on gentrification. Elgar wants to gentrify the neighborhood, but the events that take place change him. The movie focuses more on the changes that he goes through as a result of his intended gentrification. The growth of Elgar as a person is clearly evident in his actions and way of thinking throughout the movie. At first, the residents are unwelcoming to the white man in the neighborhood until they realize he’s the new landlord, with the intention of evicting the tenants and turning the tenement into a luxury home however, things don’t work out the way he hoped. As time passes by, he begins to appreciate Marge, Fanny, and the other residents. Instead of getting rid of the residents, he fixes the apartment and brings changes to it. His goal was to bring change to the neighborhood, but the neighborhood brought change for him. He falls in love with Lanie, has a child with Fanny, makes a home for himself in the ghetto neighborhood, takes custody of his child, and moves in with his girlfriend. He ended up becoming more like those he felt a connection with. He rebelled against his parents, the luxurious life he had, and their racism for a different lifestyle.

I do not think Elgar embodies the spirit of gentrification. His intentions were to change an aspect of the neighborhood, but he was changed himself. The people he interacted with   affected him strongly as he became a part of them and their community. He left behind his parents, his luxurious lifestyle for a smaller apartment in a ghetto neighborhood to live with his girlfriend and child from another woman. Gentrification usually tends to displace the poorer residents of the neighborhood. However, Elgar lets the residents stay in the tenement, thus not allowing gentrification to occur in Park Slope. Elgar becomes a part of the neighborhood, that he intended to change. His affluent background made him think that he should invest in real estate but living in Park Slope changed his way of thinking and lifestyle.

Does Elgar Enders embody the spirit of gentrification? Not quite.

The movie The Landlord (1970) posits the intent of gentrification immediately after it begins, with the acquisition of Park Slope property by Elgar. However, we soon find out that this notion of gentrification is the backdrop for a man’s coming of age journey. Elgar displays strong resolve in maintaining and refurbishing his property, especially in the face of his doubting and slightly racist parents, more to prove his independence than out of a sincere desire to renovate and improve his apartment building. While Elgar intrinsically does not embody the spirit of gentrification, which by definition would imply that he himself wishes to renovate his apartment to conform to his bourgeois taste, his acquisition of property in the heavily black neighborhood of Park Slope presents us with a slightly different take on gentrification—one that does not completely eliminate what came before in favor of new middle class ventures.

Elgar’s actions, primarily fueled by the desire to be his own man and possess his own property, are atypical of the gentrifying spirit of the time. His sexual escapades with Franny and Lanie are certainly not part of the gentrifying process, however, they illuminate his liberal views and willingness to conform, in the slightest, to his new neighborhood. It is this process of almost necessary assimilation that leads me to believe that Elgar does not want to become the tyrant landlord that oppresses his tenants with threats of eviction, as implied by the clear animosity some tenants display and the forced affection others display. The successive cuts from the pure white background in which Elgar expresses his views to the darker backdrops in which the tenants express their discontent, in addition to the reference to the white man owning property that houses subservient black people, in which a clear connection to plantations was drawn in my mind, suggests an oppressive nature of gentrification. However, Elgar seems drawn to black culture and tries hard, against the conservative views of his parents, to work within the community for its benefit.

In the end, racial tensions prevent Elgar from continuing his renovations of the apartment building and from raising a baby with Franny. While the suggested gentrification does not work so well with the polarized black community, a sliver of hope is presented at the end of the movie, when Elgar assumedly moves in with Lanie, bringing his half-white, half-black baby with him. This scene suggests that perhaps gentrification is possible, and is happening, through those who share both white and black parents; a new wave of inhabitance in the community, not so much middle-class gents, but those who share common ground between white and black, inner city and middle class.

The Landlord shows the gradual growth and change of relationships in an ethnic neighborhood between the “natives” and the “outsider.”  At first Elgar, a wealthy young man from the suburbs, does not fit in with the tenants of his tenement house in Park Slope.  He is definitely not understood by these inner city natives and comes into strange confrontations with them.  As the film progresses, however, these relations definitely improve as Elgar earns the trust and respect of his tenants.  Though the tenants’ tolerance of Elgar at first comes from a degree of fear and intimidation because he is their landlord, as can be seen when Elgar first meets Marge and Fanny, his relationships become more genuine as he gains their respect.

This movie seems to start out as a movie about gentrification.  Elgar plans on driving out the residents of the building and renovating the tenement house into a posh flat for himself to live in.  These actions would be ones that indicate gentrification and “upscaling” of the neighborhood.  There is a definite clear distinction between the world of the tenement house in Park Slope and the Ender family’s world.  Everything in Elgar’s family’s house is extremely white and bright and clean or sterile looking while the world of Park Slope was dark and dingy, reflecting the inhabitants of both scenes.  These striking differences seem kind of odd thinking about it in present times since Park Slope is a very wealthy community.  This indicates that yes, gentrification did occur in Park Slope and is probably still acting on the community and those surrounding it.  However, I think that a sort of anti-gentrification happened in this movie.  When I think of gentrification I think of wealthy people moving into a neighborhood and kicking the current residents out. While this was the initial goal of Elgar, it isn’t how it ended up.  Instead, he blended and integrated himself into their lifestyle.  He didn’t drive people out, he mixed, he became a member of the already existing community of Park Slope, both by his physical residence and by the relationships he forms and the relationships he breaks.  The fact that he eventually left the house to residents of the building further shows how he doesn’t embody the gentrification spirit of today that occurs throughout New York City. Gentrifiers don’t seek to integrate themselves into existing culture, but rather to make their own culture the dominant force.

As for the case of Elgar, I think The Landlord only exemplifies the beginnings of gentrification, if that. The neighborhood, Park Slope, that he moved into was still significantly black when the movie ended. His family was still ridiculously ignorant as well. To me, this movie did not signify any type of progression into gentrification. In its entirety, I believe this film just about a man who runs away from home (but still maintains the most of the same values) and knocks a girl up.

No, I really do not think that Elgar embodies the spirit of gentrification. The true definition of the term is “the process of renewal and rebuilding accompanying the influx of middle-class or affluent people into deteriorating areas that often displaces poorer residents.” Do I think Elgar fits this criteria? No, not at all. When Elgar arrived in Park Slope he almost assimilated within the neighborhood instead of kicking them out like the definition of gentrification suggests.

However, within the first few scenes of the movie Elgar says something along the lines of “I wan’t to fix the place up and just kick out those tenants.” His attitude here resembles that of his entire family. The ignorance of his entire family is seriously incredible. The first sign that Elgar himself is not interested in gentrifying his tenant house anymore is when he calls his family octoroons. This “major insult” drives his family to basically disown him. From this point on, Elgar begins to become more and more like his tenants.

So, does Elgar embody gentrification as it happens today? No. Rather than displace all of poor families that live in his neighborhood, he basically attempts to become one of them. I think it can even be said that Elgar’s actions were that of a revolting rich boy against his parents. He “ran away” to live on his own, then he had sex with a black women and continued to be in a relationship with another one. Every one of his actions were against what his parents desired. In my opinion, I don’t believe Elgar ever had a sincere interest in Park Slope.