THE WRAITH OF COBBLE HILL

Synopsis

On a cold, winter street in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, in a worn-down shoebox apartment, lives a teenage boy named Felix. It's just him and his unresponsive, deadbeat mom who leaves her son to fend for himself. Often, Felix will pilfer from the local corner store the bare necessities - candy bars, TV dinners, booze - and he does this under the seemingly unsuspecting noses of Mr. H, the kindly corner store owner, and his dog, Mitzie. These recent December nights, one year since Mrs. H died, when the shops have closed and a haze drifts across the moonlit Brooklyn rooftops, Mr. H returns home to replay his and his wife's favorite Polish ballads on an old 78. Felix can hear the music and Mr. H crying through the floorboards above. The loneliness felt by Felix and his upstairs neighbor, even Mitzie who's kept behind in the shop at night to keep the rats away, pervades the spaces they all share. Planning his holiday departure, Mr. H asks Felix if he would be willing to mind Mitzie and the store while he's away. When Felix accepts, it's up to him either to reciprocate the benevolence Mr. H has always shown him, or perpetuate the cycle of neglect he's been handed down as a family legacy.