THREAT

“Makes Kids look like an after-school special!” –Urb Magazine

“Unapologetically brutal and surprisingly intelligent… this film works on every conceivable level; it holds court not only as a historical document of time and place, but also as a window into the soul of American adolescence. Great art should assail the status quo, and that is what Matt Pizzolo and Katie Nisa’s film has skillfully accomplished.” –Film Threat

“Thrillingly chaotic, sickeningly violent… the story skewers you. S’like you hired private eyes to follow your kids around at night and they hired Abel Ferrara to do surveillance. It contains voices and thoughts (particularly about politics and 9/11) that you’re not likely to hear anywhere else… Hear, see, never set foot in a multiplex ever again.” –Terrorizer Magazine

“Visionary director Matt Pizzolo takes a harsh look at what it means to be a disaffected youth, showing that the promised land of opportunity and the American dream are relics of the past.” –The McGill Daily

THREAT
A Kings Mob Film
Dir. Matt Pizzolo
Written by Katie Nisa & Matt Pizzolo
Starring Carlos Puga, Keith Middleton, Katie Nisa, Rebekka Takamizu, Kamouflage
Music by Alec Empire, Atari Teenage Riot, queque, Terror

White straightedge punk-rocker Jim and black hip-hop radical Fred become friends working dead-end jobs in NYC’s Lower East Side, both of them with the hope that their newfound brotherhood will bring solidarity to their disparate communities. Instead, the alliance triggers a violent race riot that spills into the city streets with devastatingly tragic consequences. Shot entirely within the hardcore punk and hip-hop scenes, Threat is an award-winning and controversial urban thriller that has earned its maverick filmmakers both accolades and condemnations for its heady brew of street philosophy and ultraviolence. Critics have compared Threat to such hard-edged cult classics as Kids, Do The Right Thing, Easy Rider, American History X, The Warriors, Mean Streets, Fight Club, and A Clockwork Orange. See for yourself why DVD Talk likened director Matt Pizzolo to “early Martin Scorsese, Abel Ferrara, and Larry Clark.”

Produced by Kings Mob, a crew of non-professional filmmakers in their teens and early 20s, led by director Matt Pizzolo (who wrote the script while living out of a backpack at 19) and producer Katie Nisa.

THREAT was shot in the Lower East Side, Alphabet City, and Brooklyn from 1995-1998.

THREAT was shot in the Lower East Side, Alphabet City, and Brooklyn from 1995-1998.

THREAT premiered in Park City UT during the 1999 Sundance Film Festival.

After the final cut premiered at the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival in 2005, THREAT was released theatrically by HIQI Media in 2006 and was distributed on DVD by Sony-BMG later that year.