SitemapThe Place That Makes Us is a look at Youngstown, Ohio, through the eyes of a number of young people who have bucked the trend of “getting out” and decided to stay in their hometown and fight for it.
It gives a snapshot into the personal and work lives—and the often-blurry lines between them—of a couple of staff members at the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation, a business owner who also became a city council member, and a city staffer who works on codes and demolition.
Youngstown is, possibly even more than Detroit, a place that is familiar to much of the country only for its struggles, ever since the mass steel mill closures began there in the 1970s. The Place That Makes Us walks an interesting line regarding this. It intentionally avoids the kind of “ruin porn” that dramatizes decay and often leaves residents of the place depicted angry at how they’ve been stigmatized and pigeonholed. But the film also doesn’t ignore the past and its effects on the present. Indeed, the archival footage from Youngstown at its heyday interwoven with interviews that encompass residents who remember it and those who don’t, but whose childhoods were deeply affected by the ripple effects, leaves the viewer with a powerful sense of just how long the effects of such a shock linger in a place.
To see the full story from Shelter Force, click here.