Secret Mall Apartment

In 2003 in Rhode Island eight people found an unused void inside a shopping mall. About thirty square metres, left over from the architectural plan, with no door, that nobody looked at. They got in and built an apartment: a sofa, a table, a rug, a lamp and later a cinder block wall with a door. For four years they came and went. The mall operated, security patrolled, and nobody noticed. The documentary tells this through the footage they shot at the time. Jeremy Workman directs. The documentary dates from 2025. Its most concrete material is the group's own recordings; the footage shot at the time went unreleased for years and the documentary uses it for the first time. The group's aim was not a prank; people were displaced from their neighbourhood when the mall was built, and what they did is built as a response to that. At the centre is Michael Townsend, and the group is known for its art work. The documentary ties the matter to the argument over urban redevelopment and does not present it merely as a curious story. What happened in the end and how the group was caught make its last section. Its limit is structure; the narrative scatters at times and some strands run long unnecessarily. Who it is for: viewers who like urban questions and unusual true stories. Who it is not for: the image quality is poor, the narrative repeats, and the subject is narrow.