The 1964 murder of Kitty Genovese in Queens, long the basis for a misguided belief in the apathy of urban environments, is being made into a film called “37.” The title refers to the number of witnesses who reportedly saw the killing and, rather than intervene, instead withdrew into their Kew Gardens homes. It’s a debunked account that the movie’s first-time writer-director, Puk Grasten, seems to have bought into nonetheless; here’s Grasten speaking to The New York Times:
The original narrative of the Genovese murder, centering on the heartless nature of the do-nothing witnesses, turns out to be flawed in some serious ways. Behavioral scientists Rachel Manning, Mark Levine, and Alan Collins provide the most thorough takedown in a 2007 issue of the American Psychologist. After analyzing transcripts of the murder trial and other related legal documents, the research trio identifies three critical shortcomings to the initial Times report:
