Street Scene

During a hot summer in New York, the stoop and the sidewalk in front of a tenement becomes the stage for the building’s residents. The women gather to gossip, joined by the men returning home from work. Political opinions are exchanged and anti-Semitic sentiments rise to the surface. Two couples emerge from the polyphony – Anna Maurrant is an attractive woman married to the somewhat brutish Frank, and their daughter Rose and her shy secret admirer Sam. Rose’s boss is sexually harassing her, mother Anna is sleeping with the milkman. When her husband discovers them, tragedy unfolds. (Berlinale)