"The American Landscape is just an unbelievable mess. Some places are simply heartbreaking. You get the feeling that in some ways the country has culturally shot itself in the head." James Kunstler, the author of Geography of Nowhere and Home from Nowhere, lives in Saratoga Springs, New York, a place worth visiting. Besides having a small university, a world-famous racetrack, and some hot springs, Saratoga Springs also has something that is missing in most of America: a main street. Yet, with all the beauty and distinctiveness to be found in his small city, the first place Kunstler takes me to is a suburban subdivision. Here the houses all look the same: equal-opportunity ugliness. "I don't think we can overestimate the amount of depression, anxiety, and purposelessness that's being induced by environments like this." Kunstler goes on to imply that children living in subdivisions, places with no past and seemingly no future, are often the same kids who end up taking an assault weapon to class with them.

Yet some children find productive ways of venting their feelings of frustration and powerlessness. When considering his suburban childhood, director, Tim Burton says, "I had a kind of sensory deprivation growing up in Burbank. I said once that my childhood was like a kind of surreal, bright depression, and it was. I grew up in the suburbs, and somehow if you are deprived of certain feelings, there is a desire to get them out. Otherwise, you feel like you're going to explode." Burton channeled this frustration into his films, like Edward Scissorhands. He suggests that when children are deprived of outlets for self-expression, they feel an even greater need to express themselves. Many other artists quote an unpleasant childhood as a primary source of inspiration, their loneliness worsened by their suburban home-life, often isolated in a sea of grass and concrete. The majority of American children grow up in these places, where they must rely on parents to get around, and have little to do other than watch television and ride their bikes in endless circles around the cul-de-sac. These children want to act out, to express themselves. Kunstler told me, "I think one of the great delusions of our time is that suburbia is a great place to raise kids."

But wait a second; I grew up in a place like this. What does this say about me?

My documentary aims to address whether or not the suburbs affect its residents in a negative way. If so, then why we don't see it? How did we get to this point and how is it going to affect us in the future? Wasn't this supposed to be the American dream? How have the country, and its identity, been altered by this vast and relatively short suburbanization? More importantly, how has this influenced the individuals who live in this environment? Sprawlville is a personal exploration of suburban happiness, a look into a nation that's gone into hiding behind their front doors and picket fences.

Watch the Sprawlville Trailer!

Update: The Sprawlville project is no longer under development. I'm working on other stuff now.