How Hollywood Viewed New York City from the '60s Through the '80s

From the time lightweight movie cameras made it possible to shoot outside of soundstages, filmmakers have made the streets of New York City a favorite location. And certainly no era in the city’s history yielded so many memorable cinematic moments like the years spanning the mid-60s to the late-80s.

At least that’s the contention of John Hertzberg, a film-sales consultant living in Brooklyn. In his spare time (mostly nights), the one time film programmer researched, compiled, and created an epic two-hour-plus compilation of scenes shot in the Big Apple during those turbulent times — when crime skyrocketed and the city teetered on the brink of insolvency.  “I always liked New York movies that play on the stereotypes,” Hertzberg tells Nerve.com in a recent interview, “which try to convey the awfulness of how New York was, Death Wish being of course a prime example.”

Called “Fun City” — after a thoughtless remark made by Mayor John Lindsay during a crippling 1966 transit strike — the thoughtfully edited five-part series (viewable on Vimeo) uses footage from more than 100 movies, some of which are well-known (Serpico and Saturday Night Fever), and many more that are much less so (New York Ripper and Badge 373). Hertzberg seems to lament the cleaned-up (and financially sound) New York of 2013 — “People living way above their means,” he complains. “People with minor media jobs living off Central Park.” You can almost hear a touch of wistfulness in his voice when he says: “New York was not a place of wish fulfillment in the 1970s.”