[SOLD OUT] Film Screening: Gowanus Current

Join us for a screening of Gowanus Current (Jamie Courville, Chris Reynolds, 2025), a film about people, pollution, planning, and real estate on the most toxic 1.8 miles of water in America. Decades of industrial waste and raw sewage have turned Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal into one of the nation’s most toxic bodies of water. The arrival of a billion dollar EPA cleanup and a massive city-led rezoning herald a new era, but what’s of value in a neighborhood and who gets to decide? 

Shot over the course of ten years, Gowanus Current employs a strictly observational direct-cinema approach to examine the convictions of this diverse community and the textures of its landscape. A documentary portrait of activism and its limits, this is urgent civic cinema exploring the conflict engendered by a housing crisis, income inequality and a changing climate. 

About the Speakers
Sarah J. Seidman (moderator) is the Puffin Foundation Curator of Social Activism at the Museum of the City of New York, where she curates the ongoing exhibition Activist New York and other exhibitions on history, politics, and social movements. She also speaks and writes widely about activist histories, from NY1 and WNYC to Radical History Review and The American Historian. She holds a Ph.D. in American Studies and an M.A. in Public Humanities from Brown University. 

Jamie Courville (Director, Producer, Editor) and Chris Reynolds (Director, Producer, Cinematographer) are a Brooklyn-based wife and husband team that has collaborated creatively since meeting on a film set in Dallas in 2000. They each have over twenty-five years of filmmaking experience, learning the craft from the ground up working as crew members on projects large and small. This is the first documentary they are making together. Jamie’s career has included doing continuity for Muppets, editing video art, working in post for documentaries, and founding a video collective. Her audio portraits have appeared on public radio stations, both broadcast across the US and on web-based platforms. Her work examines perceptions of disease, race, gender and class. In addition to Gowanus Current, recent projects include the short experimental documentary “Kuleshov in 2020”, and “Drift”, an exhibition of media art installations contemplating the changing landscape of Gowanus, Brooklyn. Chris has worked extensively in both independent and studio film production. Climbing his way up in the camera department from Loader to Cinematographer, he has worked for a long list of talented filmmakers, learning from eminent directors like Ang Lee, Alfonso Cuaròn and David O. Russell. His work can be seen in such acclaimed projects as Silver Linings Playbook, Into the Wild, and Succession. He was also Producer and Cinematographer on Jamie Courville’s “Kuleshov in 2020” and with her co-created the media art installation “Drift.”

Comptroller Brad Lander serves as New York City’s chief financial officer, leading an office of roughly 800 public servants in their work to promote the financial health, integrity, and effectiveness of city government and secure a more thriving and sustainable future for all New Yorkers.

As investment advisor and custodian for the City’s public pension funds, Comptroller Lander stewards the retirement security of over 750,000 current and retired public sector workers, with a prudent, diversified, long-term approach to the City’s investments and obligations. Under Comptroller Lander’s leadership, three of the City’s funds have adopted a detailed plan to reach net zero emissions by 2040, among the most aggressive in the nation. The plan includes divesting from fossil fuels, engaging asset managers and portfolio companies toward decarbonization across the economy, and dramatically scaling up investments in climate solutions.

Comptroller Lander serves as the City’s budget watchdog and chief accountability officer. His audits revealed nearly a quarter of a billion dollars underreported in NYC Ferry expenditures, inadequate cost controls in Covid-19 emergency procurement, and the ineffectiveness of the City’s homeless sweeps.

Comptroller Lander’s team published the first detailed report on emergency shelter costs for asylum seekers and identified more effective strategies for addressing the humanitarian crisis. The office launched the Department of Correction Dashboard to provide much-needed transparency into City jails. And his initiative with Mayor Eric Adams to pay nonprofit human service providers on time has reduced nearly year-long payment delays.

As Comptroller, Lander has strengthened the office’s efforts to combat the climate crisis, create and preserve affordable housing, and protect workers. His Public Solar NYC plan includes an innovative “public option” to scale up rooftop solar and create good green jobs. Under his leadership, the NYC pension funds led shareholder advocacy through which most Starbucks investors voted for an independent review of the company’s labor and human rights policies and actions.

As part of his commitment to New York City’s thriving and sustainable future, Comptroller Lander is focused on improving the City’s public infrastructure. As of July 2023, Comptroller Lander has managed the issuance of a total of $7.8 billion in municipal bonds to invest in schools, parks, transportation, water and sewer, and climate resiliency projects. The office’s public finance work includes innovative social bonds and tender solicitations that have generated hundreds of millions of dollars in savings, even amid rising interest rates. Comptroller Lander also worked with the Adams Administration to improve the City’s capacity to ensure infrastructure projects are built on time and on-budget.

Prior to being elected Comptroller in 2021, Lander spent 12 years in the City Council, where he co-founded the Council’s Progressive Caucus and won transformative changes to expand workers’ rights, secure tenant protections, create affordable housing, integrate and strengthen the district’s public schools, and make streets safer. He served previously as the director of the Fifth Avenue Committee and the Pratt Center for Community Development.

Brad lives with his wife, Meg Barnette, in Brooklyn where they raised two children, Marek and Rosa, who still roll their eyes at his dad jokes.

Layla Law-Gisiko is President of The City Club of New York, where she leads the organization’s public programming and independent civic analysis. She is also a community organizer and district leader representing Chelsea. Her work focuses on the systems that shape daily life—housing, transit, public space, and good government—with particular attention to public housing residents and immigrant New Yorkers. Layla convenes coalitions, builds public-facing forums, and presses for decisions that are transparent, evidence-based, and built for the long term. She brings a practical, historically grounded view of how cities change: through design, infrastructure, and the civic will to make institutions work. Born in Paris, Layla studied French literature and journalism at La Sorbonne University. She is a journalist, documentary director, and writer. She recently published Soft Sites and Hard Truths, a humorous glossary about New York City. 

Event Timeline:
1:45 PM - Doors Open
2:00 PM - Film Begins
3:30 PM - Post-Film Discussion (Jamie Courville, Chris Reynolds, Brad Lander, and Layla Law-Gisiko) 
4:00 PM - Event Ends 

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.