If you missed The Birdman when it was part of the LES* Film Festival (it ended up winning the fest’s Neighborhood Award), here’s your chance to watch it in its entirety. Filmmaker Jessie Auritt just put the short doc online, and you can now do what you’ve never gotten up the nerve to do IRL: venture into the Birdman’s quirky First Avenue shop, packed floor-to-ceiling with cassettes, CDs, and VHS tapes (it’s no surprise the proprietor refers to cell phones as “cellu-phones,” and doesn’t know how to use them).
Needless to say, the Birdman has some thoughts about gentrification in the East Village. “I used to see them over there with the punk haircuts and the metal and I don’t see as many because the area changed on St. Marks,” he says. “It’s mostly sushi and yogurt places there. Who’s going to buy all that yogurt?”
