Vancouver has been voted the best city in the world to live in but it has a dark secret – the downtown east side ghetto. With the roughest neighbourhood and the highest crime rate in North America living conditions here are on a par with third world countries, and homelessness and addiction are rife. And yet provisions for those in need couldn’t be better.
Misha Kleider, in an effort to find out what is going wrong, goes under cover for a month in December leaving behind his apartment, his friends and his wallet to see first-hand what life on the streets is really like. Starting with nothing but his underwear he journeys through the institutions and services available to the homeless and makes some startling revelations along the way. The experience upsets any pre-conceived notions about how to “fix” the problem and what begins as a social experiment in the vein of Orwell’s’ Down and Out in Paris and London takes a darker turn as Misha connects with the real residents of the downtown east side ghetto; the addicts, the dealers and the diseased. As Misha becomes more involved in this world, the film speeds towards a shocking finale that will leave you breathless and in awe.
Streets of Plenty is a fearless, fast paced and entertaining exploration of what it means to live on the streets of North America’s worst ghetto.
Distributed by Sideways Films
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