J is for Junkie (2005)

J is for Junkie comes as a hard-hitting and beautifully shot documentary on crack and being homeless. Filmed in “The Living Room” in Atlanta, a small cove tucked in behind a Texaco gas station, the documentary captures African-American men and women opening up to Corey Davis, a young filmmaker with an artistic flare and an anthropologist’s care for documenting lived reality.

This is my first serious attempt at film making… Growing up I never had a father, because he was out running the streets getting high… Right around the time I was born, the mid 80’s, African-American communities across the country was struck by the crack epidemic. Which robbed us our prideful culture and instantly perverted it into a counter-culture where playgrounds became warzones and families were destroyed.

Growing up, I never really respected junkies… I just always knew they couldn’t be trusted and they made fucked up decisions… But one day in October, I decided to start filming a group crack addicts in Atlanta who live outside in a small cove behind a Texaco, infamously dubbed as the “Living Room” who share their stories and tell us what it’s like to live with a deadly addiction to crack-cocaine. Their stories would change me forever…

Corey Davis is a tattoo artist, illustrator, clothing designer, musician, and magazine publisher, alongside his film making. J is for Junkie is “the first of a series of documentaries I’m doing on the marginal people of America.”

Hat-tip to Mark Flanagan and to Greedmont Park Magazine.

Link to J is for Junkie on YouTube

Link to Corey Davis Video Q&A on J is for Junkie

After doing this, it’s just like I understand people struggle more… I just kinda approach it more so from a reporter aspect and try not to judge people… So I’m just trying to be broad and reach different shit that I think is weird or cool or whatever. But really most important is relevant. This is all American culture to me.

Link to Corey Davis’ website

http://blogs.plos.org/neuroanthropology/2011/05/23/j-is-for-junkie/