Magazine

A funny thing happened on the way to the McMansion.

As center cities have famously revitalized and outer suburbs have continued to lurch toward the horizon, the next generation of great urban afterthoughts has been quietly festering. Known as “first” or “inner” suburbs, the original fields where the modern American dream first sprouted are now experiencing their own version of decay.

In The New Metropolis, a pair of ambitious but limited new documentary shorts, filmmaker Andrea Torrice chronicles the depopulation, deterioration and racial tensions that have taken hold of suburban towns that, through their development over the first half of the 20th century, housed the nation’s hopes and dreams. The first installment, “A Crack in the Pavement,” narrates the plight of Madeira, a satellite of Cincinnati, Ohio, while “The New Neighbors” profiles Pennsauken Township, N.J., across the Delaware River from Philadelphia.