We have a rough cut screening set up in Dallas at the Magnolia Theater- Feb 16th 7:30
With the support of Dallas video fest- Dallas Film Festival - and Dallas film society we'll be screening a full length version of the rough cut to get feedback. If you or anyone you know is in Dallas we'd love to have you there. The last half of the film is still pretty rough but it's invaluable for us to have the opportunity to show it to an audience to get a sense of how it's working. It will be especially good to show the film to people who don't know very much about the story.

The ending of the film isn't there because the story continues. A week ago Friday a hearing took place -at which the judge was expected to transfer title of the properties to the esdc. He didn't as he said he had to review the papers... so the story continues.

We apologize for the delay in getting out rewards. We are having the T-shirts custom printed and trying to round up copies of Horns and Halos. These rewards should go out shortly

Thanks again for all of the support.

We got a lot of great feedback from our Dec 10 screening. We made a number of changes in response to the feedback and feel that the first 30 minutes works much better now. Thanks everyone

We have also continued to shoot. Unfortunately, on Dec 23, the state and the developer held a master closing, and hours later Daniel and the other property owners were served with papers, initiating the formal takings process. They continue to fight for their homes and businesses. Over at Freddy's prohibition era bar they are fighting fast and furious. Over the last few weeks they have:
1. Installed chains on the bar to handcuff themselves in case there is a standoff. The ESDC quickly responded that they would dragged off by force. Way to go government!!!!
2. Built a 9 ft beer can guillotine to kill eminent domain
3. Arranged a big boycott event for this weekend at Freddy's. Look for Steve de Seve and Donald O'Finn on Fox and Friends this Monday.

I'm updating this post because it was pointed out that I made it seem that the fight was over. It is far from over and I want to correct that.

- On another note- The NY POST named the AY story the most important Brooklyn story of the decade
http://www.nypost.com/p/brooklyn_top_stories_of_the_decade_kQFJVanQWQ7ImagKgxU3YO

Also,in breaking news- FCR's other big NY area project - Ridge Hill- in Yonkers (just north of the city) - made headlines today when several city officials were indicted for corruption charges related to the project.... maybe FCR is next
http://atlanticyardsreport.blogspot.com/2010/01/forest-city-ratner-unnamedunindicted.html

Thanks again for all of your support.

Michael Galinsky, Suki Hawley, David Beilinson

Norman Oder covered our fantastic screening/ panel discussion event -
http://atlanticyardsreport.blogspot.com/2009/12/battle-of-brooklyn-film-prompts.html
we filmed the discussion and should have it online in the coming weeks.

It was great to see the first section of the film on the big screen with a big crowd. We got a lot of feedback and have already made a lot of small changes that help significantly.

In not so good news. Forest City Ratner sold their tax free bonds today which will be used to pay for part of the arena. They had to sell them before Dec 31 because the IRS declared PILOTS (payments in lieu of taxes) illegal but allowed Ratner to grandfather their issue.

DDDB continues to fight the project.

REMINDER- SCREENING- FIRST 30 MINUTES OF THE FILM

December 10, 2009 at 7 P.M.
Cantor Center at New York University
36 East 8th Street
New York, New York 10003
Doors Open at 6:45 P.M.
Followed by panel discussion on eminent domain in New York City.

The screening--a sneak peak at the first portion of the film--will be followed by a panel discussion about the use and abuse of eminent domain in New York, featuring:

Mindy Fullilove, PhD, professor at Columbia University and author of Root Shock
William Stern, former CEO of New York State's Urban Development Corp.
Daniel Goldstein, lead plaintiff, Goldstein v. Empire State Development Corp.
Michael Galinsky, producer, Battle of Brooklyn
Norman Siegel, civil rights attorney
Robert McNamara, attorney, Institute for Justice

Excited and overwhelmed. That's how we feel right now. Your enthusiasm has inspired us, and we are extremely grateful that you chose to support this project.

373 of you stepped forward with $25,507 and pledged to help us finish Battle of Brooklyn. Getting to meet so many interesting and like-minded backers has made this Kickstarter campaign priceless. It was nail-bitting to the very end, and like the story at the heart of this film proves anything is possible with the help of communities who care about each other.

December 10th we're holding a private preview screening of the first thirty minutes and we hope those of you in New York can attend.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rumur/battle-of-brooklyn/posts/3891

In the next few days we'll update you on our next steps with the project and will send out your respective rewards.

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

Stay tuned...

Mike, Suki, David

We have been editing pretty much full time for over a year- and for the previous five years we logged tapes- and did minor editing. It's hard to put together a story when you don't have the end.

The following is one version of the opening of the film that we put together. When working on a film, one of the things you have do often is "kill your darlings." One has to be able to take out some of the best scenes if they don't serve the larger goal of telling the best overall story. My partner Suki just pointed out that one way to deal with doing this is to avoid looking back. It's difficult to let things go - but it's nice to be able to share them in this way.

Thank you all again for your support.

michael, David, Suki

I know that many of the people pledging to our film have done so without a lot of background information on the Atlantic Yards Project.

It's kind of hard to believe, but when we started shooting, blogs were just beginning to become a part of mainstream culture. However, blogs grew to have a major impact on the story and the project. I wanted to point you to three of them as they can quickly bring you up to speed if interested.

Atlantic Yards Report was started by journalist Norman Oder as a response to what he thought was terrible coverage by the NY Times. It has grown into THE source of original reporting on the project. Last May Mr. Oder posted this primer. His reporting is much more in depth than any other coverage of the project and is now read by most journalists covering the story. Just yesterday he broke a story about the ESDC possibly floating an extra 400 million dollars in bonds for the project.

nolandgrab is currently run by Lumi Rolley, Eric Mcclure, and Steve Soblick (researching the founders right now). Each day the site compiles all of the news that touches on the story. The site has been very supportive of our kickstater efforts- and it's one of the first things I check each morning. I can't keep up with Norman Oder and they do a good job of paraphrasing his posts.
DDDB.net is the website of the primary opposition group. Like nolandgrab this site compiles news and analysis- but it also has alternative plans - and loads of important information.

With a 2 hour movie it is going to be impossible for us to cover the complexities of the story- including the imapct of the blogs. We'll be working on a very dense website that will work to include these aspects of the story. The same is true with a short blog post. I also wanted to ad Noticing New York, another blog that had done a great job of getting to the truth about the story from an ex-insder's perspective.

Here's a tv news story about the project that aired on CBS tonite. They were gracious enough to allow us to film as they put it together. We like to film as media covers a story because it allows us to both convey important information- and give viewers a sense of how these events affect the characters lives.

December 10, 2009 at 7 P.M.
Cantor Center at New York University
36 East 8th Street
New York, New York 10003
Doors Open at 6:45 P.M.
Followed by panel discussion on eminent domain in New York City.

Daniel Goldstein's condo sits at center court of developer Bruce Ratner's proposed basketball arena in Brooklyn.

Battle of Brooklyn follows Daniel's six-year-long David vs. Goliath fight to save his home and community from being seized through eminent domain for Ratner's massive Atlantic Yards project.

The screening--a sneak peak at the first portion of the film--will be followed by a panel discussion about the use and abuse of eminent domain in New York, featuring:

Mindy Fullilove, PhD, professor at Columbia University and author of Root Shock
William Stern, former CEO of New York State's Urban Development Corp.
Daniel Goldstein, lead plaintiff, Goldstein v. Empire State Development Corp.
Michael Galinsky, producer, Battle of Brooklyn
Norman Siegel, civil rights attorney
Robert McNamara, attorney, Institute for Justice

Please RSVP by Monday, December 7, by contacting Lancee Kurcab at (703) 682-9320 or LKurcab@ij.orgThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .

We have just 60 hours to reach our goal-
Please consider reaching out to friends who know how important this project is - but haven't taken the time to support it just yet

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rumur/battle-of-brooklyn

we are confident that we'll make the goal- we've seen this time and again on kickstarter- a lot of people waiting till the last minute- so join the rush.

With 5 days to go we are thankful that we have gotten so much support for our project. We are nearly 60% of the way to our goal. In order to reach that goals we are asking you to persuade one or two of your friends to also get involved. If you are part of a local list serve consider posting something about the project.

We are confident that we can reach our fund goal because we know how important this film is.

Happy Thanksgiving

michael, david, suki

New York Daily News nailed it with their piece on Dan, Shabnam and Sita.

Please consider sending this story to a friend that might be interested in helping us to tell the story.

We have six days to reach our goal. With yesterday's court loss it is even more important that we get this story told.

It was a depressing shoot this morning. For the last several days I have gotten to Dan and Shabnam's early in the morning in order to shoot as they waited for the verdict on their community's eminent domain case. The NY State Court of Appeals posts decisions between 8:30 and 9:30. Dan nervously hit refresh on his mouse for minutes at a time waiting for the decision to get posted. At about 3 minutes after 9 today he yelled out, "It's up!" Moments later he flatly stated, "We lost."

There were no tears or hair pulling - there was work to do - media to talk to and a press conference to hold.

He had a press release ready to go win or lose.

We didn't start this project with a particular beef against eminent domain. We heard about the project and we were curious and started shooting to find out what was going on. What we found out disturbed us. That sense of disturbance has only grown over the course of our shooting.

On the bright side of things- we have spent 6 years shooting and editing to make sure that this story doesn't go unnoticed. We have an incredible film that will shine a bright light on the situation. We also have an incredible community of friends and supporters who have come together to help us get this film made. We have now reached the 50% mark in our funding goal and we have a week to raise the rest.

If the over 200 people that have helped us out can take a moment to tell a few other people about our project we will reach our goal with plenty of time to spare.

While we were hoping that our main characters would prevail in their lawsuit, not only for their sake - but to bring a quick end to our shooting - we also know that this legal outcome makes the film that much more necessary.

Thanks to everyone for all the support.