Dogtown Redemption

Premiered May 16, 2016

Directed by

Amir Soltani and Chihiro Wimbush

Four recyclers struggle to survive in an Oakland neighborhood already decimated by unemployment, addiction, and violence.

Preview

EXPLORE THE FILM

About the Documentary

A surprising number of people make their living off our nation’s vast rivers of trash. Dogtown Redemption follows the lives of three of these people over the course of seven years: Jason Witt, the ultimate recycling hustler, who often hauls around a shopping cart that weighs over a ton; Landon Goodwin, a former minister who struggles with his own fall from grace; and Miss Hayok Kay, the daughter of a prominent Korean family and one-time drummer for popular 1980s Bay Area punk-polka band Polkacide, but now an economic castaway at the mercy of the streets. Each survives by redeeming bottles, cans, and assorted other recyclables in an area of West Oakland, California nicknamed “Dogtown.”

Weaving in the fascinating, complex history of the area for context, the story revolves around Alliance Metals, a bustling recycling center that has divided the West Oakland neighborhood. Residents of new developments view Alliance as a noisy nuisance that attracts scavengers, drug dealers, and criminals. The rattle of the shopping carts, missing garbage cans, litter on the streets, public defecation, theft, crime, and trespassing are offered as evidence that the recyclers are a blight upon the neighborhood. But the center is the only constant in the life of these denizens of the street, and for many of them literally a lifeline, a financial hub, and a community center. Yet with commodity prices collapsing, neighbors calling for a ban on shopping cart traffic, and Alliance Metals slated to close in August 2016, the way of life is threatened for people like Miss Kay, whose own family abandoned her years ago, and for the devout Goodwin, so close to turning his life into a redemption story.

The question of who owns our garbage makes these otherwise marginal characters important voices in a conflict over race, class, mental health, and space in a modern American city. Dogtown Redemption humanizes this other America, one that many of us never see.

The Filmmaker

Amir Soltani (Director, Producer) is an Iranian American human rights activist who has worked in journalism, philanthropy, and business. He is the author of Zahra’s Paradise, a New York Times-bestselling graphic novel on Iran’s 2009 protests. Soltani studied history at Tufts and Harvard. Dogtown Redemption is his first documentary film. Chihiro Wimbush (Director, Co-Producer, Cinematographer) is a hapa, Oakland-based filmmaker. Most recently he served as editor of the award-winning Changing Season: On the Masumoto Family Farm. With his wife Meena Srinivasan, he creates mindful media and education content via their nonprofit organization, A Lens Inside. Between chasing shopping carts and other stories, Wimbush writes and tries to lure his musical muse out of hiding.

Full Credits