Kill the Poor

Kill the Poor is director Alan Taylor's screen adaptation of a novel by Joel Rose. The film is set in Manhattan's Alphabet City in the early 1980s, when the neighborhood was a center of illegal drug activity. The film's title comes from the Dead Kennedys song Kill the Poor. Kill the Poor begins with a fire in the apartment of tough guy Carlos DeJesus and his troublemaking son Segundo. The screenplay then focuses on the other tenants of the rundown building in an attempt to determine who set the blaze. The other principles are: A shared distrust of Carlos and Segundo unites this eclectic group and prompts them to hold "co-op" meetings with one goal: eviction of Carlos and Segundo DeJesus. Kill the Poor was first screened at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2003. It was then shown in 2006 at the IFC Center in New York City.