Dirty Old Town (2012) is a vérité-style snapshot of the Bowery at a tipping point—where gentrification, desperation, and raw creativity collide. Co-directed and produced by The Cinemart, the documentary-fiction hybrid centers on a grizzled antiques dealer who finds himself three days away from eviction. What begins as a scramble to save his storefront becomes an offbeat portrait of survival in a disappearing New York. As word spreads about his precarious situation, an eclectic cast of artists, drifters, and downtown eccentrics converge on the shop, bringing with them schemes, stories, and a final flash of outlaw energy.

Filmed in true guerrilla style, Dirty Old Town captures the grit and surreal charm of a neighborhood that once defined the fringe of Manhattan culture. The Cinemart helped shape the film’s raw, intimate tone by embedding themselves fully in the world they were documenting. Their approach blurred the line between narrative and documentary, capturing a fading New York with an urgency that mirrored the city’s own unraveling under the pressure of gentrification and cultural displacement.