Narrative can take many forms-disparate materials, unusual projections, shifting storytellers. In A Small Jubilee (1987, 7 mins), Shalom Gorewitz ponders the death of his grandmother, using exquisite alterations of image to illustrate faith and despair. Jem Cohen's This Is a History of New York (1988, 23 mins, B&W) chronicles the seven ages of mankind from prehistory to the space age. In the age of “Hunters and Gatherers,” stray dogs patrol the streets while the homeless forage for food. Later, in the “Medieval Period,” crazed street preachers pace frantically before ominous gothic architecture. The richness of Cohen's vision is found in his haunting imagery and the perception that the thriving city of New York is really the accumulation of humanity's failures. Mike, the ever-put-upon Michael Smith alter-ego, gets his own rock video, complete with theme music, in Go for It, Mike (1984, 4:40 mins). His schlemiel spiel redefines “rugged individualism” as a sickly spectacle. Fusing elements of drama, comedy, and documentary, Shelly Silver's The Houses That Are Left (1991, 51 mins) follows the lives of thirtysomethings besieged by doubts about their urbane lives. In the midst of this story, people on the street are interviewed for the purposes of market research, and the dead watch the living on TV, commenting all the while with pithy indifference.