Washingston Post. April 23, 2004
New York Times. January 30, 2004
New York Times. October 29, 2003
Connecticut Post. November 2, 2003
Film Threat. June 26th, 2003
Variety. June 16th, 2003
Variety. November 10th, 2002
The New York Post. October 16th, 2002
New York Magazine: Restaurants. From the week of October 7th, 2002
Films In Review
The New York Observer
New York 1 Interview

'Eat This New York': This Film Cooks

By Ann Hornaday, Washington Post Staff Writer

When you see "Eat This New York" -- and you really should see it -- go on a full stomach. This lively, absorbing documentary about best friends who open a tiny cafe in the heart of Brooklyn is full of such mouth-watering shots of cooking and eating that a jumbo-sized popcorn and pallid soda simply won't do.

"Eat This New York" opens with some sobering statistics. There are 18,000 restaurants in New York, and 1,000 new ones open every year. Only one out of five of those will succeed. Against the backdrop of those long-shot odds, we meet John McCormick and Billy Phelps, Minneapolis transplants who have always wanted to run a cafe in the tradition of 1920s Paris, playing host to all manner of artists, musicians, poets and neighborhood wags. "Eat This New York" begins in July 2001, when McCormick finds the ideal spot, a vest-pocket corner building in Williamsburg, a polyglot Brooklyn neighborhood where young hipsters rub shoulders with Hasidic Jews and Dominican and Puerto Rican immigrants.

It's the ideal demographic soup for McCormick and Phelps, and they begin gutting the minuscule space -- and entering that circle of hell known as "renovation." While the film's subjects dicker with contractors and chefs and loan officers (and while they progressively drain their respective bank accounts), directors Kate Novack and Andrew Rossi set off to interview the stars of New York's restaurant world, gleaning reminiscences and advice from such gastronomical luminaries as Drew Nieporent (Montrachet, Nobu), Daniel Boulud (Daniel, db Bistro Moderne), Rocco DiSpirito (Union Pacific), Sirio Maccioni (Le Cirque), Keith McNally (Balthazar, Pastis) and others. Although they have all been hugely successful, there's a world-weariness they share, even the ebullient Maccioni, who admits he hates his job and wakes up every day promising himself to be good in spite of his distaste for the business.

As every restaurateur knows, and as McCormick and Phelps come to learn over 14 excruciating months, that business is a heartbreaker. Between those palate-tempting sequences in Manhattan's most exclusive eateries, we follow the two Midwesterners as they confront much more than they bargained for (at one point, their relationship becomes so strained that McCormick goes into therapy; the therapist winds up being an investor).

Dust, disagreements and endless delays -- while Novack and Rossi keep a running account of the schedule with a calendar at the bottom of the screen -- give the cafe project a sort of Sisyphean sense of timelessness, as if this is what these two young men were put on Earth to do: not open a restaurant, but simply work to get it open, forever. (The directors keep the proceedings from getting bogged down with sprightly editing and a lyrical score by New York musicians Steve O'Reilly and Matt Anthony.)

As painful as that process gets at times, it still has its pleasures, like the impromptu Halloween party McCormick and Phelps throw while the cafe is still under construction. Juxtaposed with scenes at Daniel that could be straight out of Tom Wolfe are shots of people eating pizza and drinking beer by candlelight; it's clear which group is having more fun. Novack and Rossi do a terrific job of capturing the absurdities of the restaurant business -- at one point Phelps and McCormick are seen eradicating pigeon poop, and a little while later one of the Manhattan restaurateurs sheepishly puts lucky coins under tables at the instruction of a feng shui coach.

But "Eat This New York" also conveys the nurturing, almost spiritual side of the restaurant world, which even at its most haute is still in the business of one of the human race's most sacred rituals. It wouldn't be sporting to indicate how "Eat This New York" turns out, but the ending is enormously satisfying and moving. DiSpirito has a "reality" show about a similar theme on TV, but he couldn't have anything on a couple of guys from Minnesota with a few bucks and a shared dream of creating their own movable feast.

Eat This New York (80 minutes, at Visions Bar Noir) is not rated. It contains very brief profanity. Today at the 7:15 p.m. screening, local chef Nora Pouillon of Restaurant Nora and Asia Nora will answer questions after the movie and will offer a sampling of dishes from her restaurants. Other local chefs will appear Saturday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Tickets to these special events are $10.

A Dollar, a Dream, a Brooklyn Boîte

By ELVIS MITCHELL

It will be impossible for you to walk past a shuttered restaurant and not feel a chill after seeing the documentary "Eat This New York,"which opens today in Manhattan. The directors Andrew Rossi and Kate Novack may not be great filmmakers - it's hard to tell, based on this bare-bones picture - but they know a great story, and more important, how to tell it. The movie will grip those fascinated by the restaurant business, like myself, and those who merely drift by the Food Network on the way to MoreMax or Speedvision on the cable dial.

The directors demonstrate an eye for intriguing real-life drama. They get it from the film's subjects, John McCormick and Billy Phelps. The guys are a pair of starry-eyed would-be restaurateurs from Minneapolis - "Well, St. Paul, actually," Mr. McCormick clarifies - opening a new spot, Moto, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. As they discuss their thoughts for their slice-shaped eatery, they're like the young sisters in Jim Sheridan's "In America," their eyes gleaming with joy at a first glimpse of the Manhattan skyline.

They plant their flag far from the madding crowd, not in an area with heavy street traffic but in a section of town that serves as a kind of no man's land. "I have no food experience, no restaurant experience," Mr. Phelps admits, and then adds, "I don't know how many local customers we'll get there."

But their goal to cobble a big-deal dining nexus in an uncharted zone isn't nearly as nutty as it may seem; remember, the meatpacking district in Manhattan is now as hot as an Emeril entree. Keith McNally, whose Pastis rules that part of town, speaks about getting started in the restaurant business. (Mr. McCormick and Mr. Phelps use his carpenter to help build their place.) The other gourmet luminaries in "Eat" include the downtown dining lord Drew Nieporent, as well as the Continental chef/superstar Daniel Boulud and the editor in chief of Gourmet magazine, Ruth Reichl.

"Eat" begins with a black screen and graphics that offer truly daunting New York statistics: "Every year, more than 1,000 new restaurants open" and "four out of five restaurants go out of business within five years." For anyone who walks the streets of the Lower East Side and observes the number of thriving shops that sell used restaurant equipment, those facts seem borne out.

"Eat" works as a fascinating response to the chef-worship culture that is, for example, celebrated on an hourly basis on the Food Network: the concept that opening an eatery is synonymous with success. The movie creates an understandable context for the aspirants' dreams; they're mesmerized by the Parisian diner culture of the 1920's - a fantasy that has obviously already overtaken Chelsea - and are looking to take their version of that era to Brooklyn.

It's fascinating to hear Mr. Phelps drop the word "cafe" as if it were going to transform him into Captain Marvel, and then have "Eat" cut to Mr. Nieporent as he tells his story of building Montrachet out of nothing, taking a big gamble doing so. He does this on his way to accepting yet another lifetime achievement award, and the glamour sparkles around him like a force field. (Someone could probably do a film on the number of lifetime achievement awards that major restaurant figures receive in a calendar year.)

"Eat This New York" lets its on-camera figures, like Ms. Reichl, explain the sociological phenomena that make New York a singular restaurant town. And it makes a case for the battalions of idealists who hit the city determined to carve a place for themselves; the movie's subtle subtext is that restaurants are as big a reason for coming to New York as starting a band or writing a novel, only the restaurant path is far more treacherous.

by Amanda Hesser

THREE years ago, John McCormick and Billy Phelps set out to open a restaurant, a business with a painfully high failure rate. They had no cooking experience and no restaurant experience. They just barely had an idea. Mr. McCormick was riding his motorcycle through a seedy neighborhood in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, one day when he saw the spot: on a street corner under the elevated line was a worn-down, graffiti-ridden building in the shape of a slice of cake. Moto, named after the owners' passions for motorcycles, was conceived.

But it was far from born. In an entertaining new documentary, "Eat This New York," Kate Novack and Andrew Rossi, the directors, follow Mr. McCormick and Mr. Phelps throughout their odyssey, capturing the pure grit it takes to open a restaurant in New York.

The film begins in Mr. Phelps's red pickup truck. He sits up tall and looks optimistic. "This isn't about covers," he says, meaning the number of people who will eat in his restaurant in a given day. "This isn't about the money." The curse is in place.

Soon the partners are holed up in a money pit, and it's mostly a pit. They are trying to get loans, trying to get a liquor license, trying to get along. With a few handy friends, they are putting together a cafe-bistro-coffee shop (they are not really sure) with a friendly, homespun appeal.

Interspersed with the tense, gray scenes of their struggle are interviews with New York culinary lions. Drew Nieporent, an owner of Nobu and Montrachet, is shown in a tuxedo, being driven around Manhattan to an event in which he is the honoree. In another scene, Keith McNally reflects on his empire. "I try to build places I'd like to go to, really," he says. And Daniel Boulud of Daniel reminisces about his boyhood on a humble farm. Their stories are laced with hope and contentment.

Meanwhile, Mr. Phelps and Mr. McCormick are eating subs and Entenmann's doughnuts in their construction zone. One night in December (months after they missed their first of many opening dates), they are filmed laying concrete for their front doorstep. It is cold and raining. They are mixing the concrete in the dark, in a wheelbarrow. Mr. Phelps, at wit's end, says, "I did this to enrich my life, though, right?"

Their misery is buffered by the interviews with Manhattan successes. And these clips turn out to be some of the most enjoyable parts of the film. At Osteria del Circo, two of Sirio Maccioni's sons, Marco and Mauro, are putting on their practiced charm. Marco flirts with a tableful of women. They flirt back, playfully. Then Marco is out on the street, striding toward a deli. "I've done this a million times," he says. "You just buy a disposable camera. Then you give it to them as a present and they're like, `Oh, you're so nice! You're so sweet!' " As he nears the store, Mauro is on his way out, camera in hand. "Oh, you got it already," Marco Maccioni says.

Back in Siberia, loans are rejected, months flip by like a news zipper and only when the restaurant is about to open do the partners get around to discussing the food - their very reason for being.

Early in the film, Mr. Phelps explained this lapse. "We're all searching for these kinds of pockets we can call our own," he says. Moto isn't about food, in other words, but identity.

That's no business plan, but three years into their experience, Moto, at 394 Broadway at Division Street, remains open. And, if you don't mind the J train grinding above your head, the food is very good.

by Joe Meyers

The fantasy of running a restaurant or café is shared by people of all ages and backgrounds.

In New York, the fantasy verges on mania, with 1,000 new eateries opening every year.

Of course, the downside of that dream is the cold hard fact that only one out of five new restaurants survives the first year.

The husband-and-wife filmmaking team of Yale grad Andrew Rossi and Time magazine reporter Kate Novack explore the creation of a new Brooklyn restaurant in their terrific documentary, "Eat This New York."

The film is having its television debut on Sundance Channel this month, but will be opening in art theaters around the country after the first of the year.

The documentary arrives on the heels of the NBC summer reality series, "The Restaurant," which followed the opening of Rocco Dispirito's restaurant, Rocco's, in Manhattan.

Although the NBC production was a multi-part series, it didn't have nearly the depth or entertainment value of the Rossi and Novack film.

The documentary gives us a much broader view of the New York restaurant scene by including interviews with some of the city's top restaurateurs, along with footage showing the long effort to open a little café called Moto in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn.

In a phone interview last week, Rossi said he and his wife found the would-be restaurant operators, Billy Phelps and John McCormick, by checking out liquor license applications.

The filmmakers also considered another duo, "but they didn't seem as open."

Unlike many Manhattan restaurants that are financed and opened in a manner similar to that of a big Broadway show, Phelps and McCormick had to struggle to raise the money and then do most of the construction themselves.

The duo had the advantage of finding a Brooklyn space with a relatively low monthly rent, but the space was raw and we watch what often looks like an insurmountable effort to turn it into a place where Williamsburg hipsters would like to hang out.

Like so many other friends who have become business partners, Phelps and McCormick run into conflicts over money and Rossi said there were times when he feared Moto would never open.

"I thought they might wind up storing their motorcycles there," the filmmaker joked.

As interesting as the Moto scenes are, the film's subject is greatly expanded by the many successful restaurant people Rossi and Novack interviewed.

The cast of characters is a Who's Who of the New York food world, including Sirio Maccioni of Le Crique, Danny Meyer of the Union Square Café and Gramercy Tavern, Keith McNally of Pastis and Balthazar and Drew Nieporent, whose hugely successful restaurants include Montrachet and Nobu.

There is also an interview with Dispirito of NBC's "The Restaurant."

Valuable background, and balance, is provided by Ruth Reichl, editor of Gourmet magazine and the former critic for The New York Times.

Rossi said that assembling this mighty group of experts for a low-budget documentary was something akin to casting a Hollywood movie.

"We started with Sirio," Rossi said of Le Cirque's owner-operator.

"Once we had one big name star, the other people became interested," the filmmaker added.

Rossi said he believes the film reinforces Nieporent's belief that the restaurant business in New York is "as culturally significant as movies or the theater."

New York foodies were recently galvanized by the announcement that a little-known Brooklyn restaurant called Grocery will be ranked No. 7 in the new "Zagat Guide" to New York restaurants.

Rossi said he wasn't so surprised that an eatery in Brooklyn would wind up in the top 10 among the great Manhattan restaurants.

"I'm not sure if it's an overstatement to say that Brooklyn is leading a restaurant revolution," Rossi said.

"For one thing, the rents have just gotten too expensive in Manhattan - so I think it's easier to experiment and try new things in Brooklyn," he added.

The Yale grad said he has been pleased by the positive reaction to the film so far at festivals and was looking forward to getting the movie into theaters next year. "I really want to show it in New Haven," he said of his college stomping ground.

by Dean Edward
2003, Un-rated, 80 Minutes

The coda of this fascinating look at the cutthroat restaurant business in the Big Apple lets us know that four out of every five begun will go out of business within the first five years. These are not the most encouraging figures in the world, but they also support the old axiom, "If you can make it here..."

eat this (a wonderful title for a documentary) follows two average joes in their quest to open the next big thing. McCormick and Phelps are two motorcycle enthusiasts who have found the perfect space for a cafe, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, smack dab in the middle of the Orthodox Jews and the Puerto Ricans: Division Avenue. The space is small but the possibilities are wide open; both men share a vision of the cafes of the forties in gay Paree, where the people gathered nightly to eat, drink, and be artistic.

We watch as the two start to put their dream to work. Neither one has any restaurant experience. Money is a constant problem, as various loans are sought to continue the work. There is a lot of bickering between them as things get tight. The presence of the camera acts as a mediator at times like this, forcing them to discuss rather than shout, especially in a terse conversation about money with their main designer and builder, Greg Fox. You can tell that they are trying not to look like pricks on camera.

As a counterpoint to the creation of the cafe, the filmmakers have landed interviews with some of the most successful restaurateurs in New York. Maccioni, an old Italian with a wicked sense of humor and proprietor of the world famous Le Cirque, tells of Sinatra and Onassis fighting over "their" table. We also see him giving a lifetime achievement award to Nieporent, the Andrew Lloyd Webber of the dining world, a man who has had more successful restaurants than anyone else in the city. They interview him on his way to get the award, a big, friendly faced man in his fifties, wearing a rumpled tuxedo and talking of his "vision" back in the early eighties. Here was a man who re-envisioned dining in New York.

Other faces drift by...McNally, who gave up the idea of running a bistro in Paris to open his first restaurant in NY, now running many more (a partial list includes Odeon, Lucky Strike, and Balthazar), Reichl, the editor in chief of "Gourmet Magazine", Zagat, the creator of the indispensable Zagats Restaurant Guide, who has some of the best advice to give ("You can?t just be someone who likes to cook and think that?s it: you need to be a businessman, a designer, an accountant, and a PR agent").

Filmmakers Rossi and Novack have done a wonderful job of making all of this entertaining, not just for those interested in the business, but to us ordinary joes as well. By the end of the film, you will be rooting for McCormick and Phelps to make it.

'Eat This' on menu at Arrow, Sundance
Cabler to air cuisine fare in November on U.S. TV

By DAVID ROONEY

NEW YORK -- Arrow Features has picked up domestic and international rights to Andrew Rossi and Kate Novack's feature documentary "Eat This New York," which goes behind the scenes to look at Gotham's top restaurants and chefs.

In a separate deal, Sundance Channel has acquired U.S. television rights to the pic, which will air in November, ahead of Arrow's planned theatrical run in January.

Docu, which premiered at the 2002 Hamptons Film Festival, follows two best friends from the Midwest who move to New York to pursue their dream of opening a restaurant, suffering through financial crisis, the loss of their chef and a crumbling relationship.

Their story is interwoven with visits to celebrated eateries like Le Cirque 2000, Cafe Boulud, Balthazar, Gramercy Tavern, Nobu and Jean-Georges, where the filmmakers talk to such foodie tastemakers as Daniel Boulud, Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Danny Meyer and Sirio Maccioni and guidebook guru Tim Zagat.

"Only one out of five new restaurants in New York survives longer than five years," said Novack. "So the stories of how these restaurateurs made it is about great talent and a lot of luck."

Arrow will handle theatrical and video/DVD release and will sell the film worldwide through its Paris-based Arrow Films Intl. sales arm.

Acquisitions chief John Cusimano negotiated with the filmmakers for the Arrow deal; VP of film programming Christian Vesper negotiated for Sundance Channel.

Date in print: Mon., Jun. 16, 2003, Los Angeles
http://www.variety.com/index.asp?layout=news_edition&type=losangeles

Crosscutting between the creme de la creme of Gotham restaurateurs at their swanky four-star eateries and two guys from the Midwest with little money and no restaurant experience struggling to open a bistro in Brooklyn, eat this new york is a study in contrasts and an insider view of what it takes to have culinary success in the Big Apple...the docu, serving up interesting insights into the unique restaurant culture of NYC, should prove appetizing in urban venues and fit right into food-friendly cable.

October 16, 2002 -- "EAT This New York," a new documentary premiering Friday night at the Hamptons International Film Festival could be called "Eat This New York If You Dare" since it opens with the statistic that more than 1,000 restaurants open every year- and only 20 percent survive five years or more.

The tale of two best friends from Minnesota with zero restaurant experience - Billy Phelps and John McCormick - struggling to open Moto, a cozy cafe in Williamsburg, portrays New York's cutthroat restaurant business.

While Moto's struggle is interesting, the real juicy tidbits come from leaders in New York's food world who are interviewed by filmmakers Andrew Rossi and Kate Novack.

The city's rock-star restaurateurs - Danny Meyer, Sirio Maccioni, Drew Nieporent and Keith McNally - tell stories about their humble beginnings while Moto's opening keeps getting delayed.

McNally - who owns Pastis, Balthazar and Pravda - describes how decades ago, his friend Anna Wintour offered him a job managing a boutique in Paris with her then-boyfriend.

She accidentally turned him into a restaurateur by wining and dining him around Paris, inspiring him to open the Odeon in TriBeCa in 1980.

"To seduce me to take this job managing a boutique, she took me to all these restaurants," he recalls.

Meyer remembers checking coats during the early days of Union Square Cafe, while Le Cirque's Maccioni reminisces about tantrums for the best table at the Colony restaurant between Frank Sinatra, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and Aristotle Onassis.

The documentary also features stark contrasts between Manhattan's elegant and established dining rooms and Moto's state of disarray.

A scene of Phelps and McCormick mixing cement in a rainstorm quickly cuts to Jean-Georges Vongerichten's bustling four-star restaurant.

"Taking chances and risks," says Vongerichten from his kitchen, "that's what it's all about in New York."

If Moto's owners want to upscale their panini and salads menu to get a four-star review, they could take Daniel Boulud's advice: "Be perfect" and "you must be yourself."

To purchase a $10 ticket for Saturday's screening or a $25 premiere ticket of "Eat This New York," call (866) 468-7619 or log onto www.ticketweb.com.

Restaurant Openings
edited by Rob Patronite and Robin Raisfeld
Week of October 7, 2002

Moto

When Billy Phelps and John McCormick were building Moto, their Williamsburg bar and café, not only did they contend with construction delays, loan rejections, and, as tensions mounted, each other - they did it all under the prying lenses of a pair of documentary filmmakers. The café's torturous eighteen-month gestation was captured in excruciating detail by Kate Novack and Andrew Rossi in Eat This New York, premiering this month at the Hamptons International Film Festival, where it's sure to appeal to the same audience that flocked to Fully Committed and devoured Kitchen Confidential.

The plot: Two friends from Minneapolis harbor the romantic fantasy of opening a café. They find the perfect off-the-beaten-track location - a decrepit check-cashing joint below the el at the intersection of Hasidic Williamsburg and Hispanic Williamsburg. They don overalls and build the place from the ground up, the same meticulous way they rebuild their beloved vintage European motorbikes (hence the name). They bicker, cadge money, and dream of a subway train's leaping the tracks and destroying the place. For perspective and comic relief, the filmmakers juxtapose interviews with some of New York's most successful chefs and restaurateurs. Keith McNally wistfully longs for his own bootstrap beginnings, Daniel Boulud loses patience with his staff during peak dinner service, and Sirio Maccioni wonders whether it was all worth it. Now that Moto is open - its kitchen turning out an evolving menu of panini and salads, its cozy premises often filled with live music - Phelps and McCormick have put the worst behind them. Those days are gone but not forgotten, and coming soon to a theater near you. - robin raisfeld

One of the true crowd pleasers of the 2002 Festival, this work is a history lesson, sociological study, economic tutorial, character analysis and cautionary tale of the ins and outs of the New York Restaurant business. This documentary follows the uneasy ups and downs of trying to succeed in the restaurant business in the Big Apple. Specifically, it follows two guys from the start of their attempts to renovate and build a restaurant in Brooklyn to the point when they open the business (many months later than scheduled). The filmmakers interview several well known figures in the food industry (Daniel Boulud, Sirio Maccioni, Tim Zagat, etc.) who recount some of the trials and tribulations related to the food business in New York. This film depicts in such vivid, painful detail the heroic/foolish struggle of the two fledgling restaurannters that the audience is almost as relieved as the protagonists are when things seem to finally go in their favor at the end.

Eat, the Documentary

Andrew Rossi grew up in New York restaurants. For approximately 30 years his parents, Rubrio and Suzanne Rossi, owned and operated Parioli Romanissimo on First Avenue, between 76th and 77th streets (and later, on 81st Street between Madison and Fifth), which may be the only Italian restaurant ever to win four stars-the highest rating-from a New York Times restaurant critic.

Mr. Rossi often helped his parents out, but when it came time to make a career choice, he heeded his father's advice: Don't go into the restaurant business. Unlike his St. David's classmate, Mauro Maccioni-who followed his father, Le Cirque owner Sirio Maccioni, into the kitchen-Mr. Rossi went to Harvard Law School and, after a stint at the firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, ventured into the nice, secure business of filmmaking.

On Oct. 18 and 19, Mr. Rossi, 29, and his wife, co-producer and co-director Kate Novack, 30, will show their first film at the Hamptons Film Festival. It's called Eat This New York and is-surprise, surprise-a digital-video documentary about the New York restaurant business. As their press materials note, every year more than 1,000 new restaurants open in New York City; only one in five survives. Eat This New York juxtaposes interviews with a number of the city's successful chefs and restaurateurs-including Daniel Boulud, Mauro and Sirio Maccioni, Montrachet's Drew Nieporent, Pastis' Keith McNally and Jean-Georges Vongerichten-with the mind-boggling experiences of two friends, commercial photographer Billy Phelps and fledgling restaurateur John McCormick, who are both now 37, as they test the limits of their relationship and their solvency by attempting to open a tiny little restaurant called Moto with their own money (80 percent of it Mr. Phelps') in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn.

As is often the case in the restaurant business, pretty much anything that can go wrong does for Mr. McCormick-who was previously involved in a Soho restaurant called Palacinka-and Mr. Phelps. After initially estimating that it will take a few months to realize their vision, the job drags on for a year and a half.

In one painful scene, the men begin to pour the cement stoop to their restaurant as a rain storm begins, and what should have been a minor construction job blossoms into a major ordeal, leaving little doubt about what the elder Maccioni means when he says on camera that when he comes into work in the morning, "I am mad."

Mr. Rossi admitted that he couldn't help feeling for Moto's partners. "At the nadir of their project and their relationship," he said, "I thought, ÔThis sucks. These guys have been through hell and back.'" But Mr. Rossi said he also remembered thinking: "Whoa-now we have an arc to the story."

Interestingly, as Mr. Phelps and Mr. McCormick's experience was bottoming out, the filmmakers' relationship was blossoming. Mr. Rossi and Ms. Novack, a Dartmouth and Columbia journalism-school graduate whose father is AOL Time Warner vice chairman Ken Novack, had been dating off and on since 1999-long before they began the film-and on June 1, almost two months before Moto opened, they decided to marry. "It was a very intense experience to film this and work on it together," Mr. Rossi said. "We spent 24-7 together, and we definitely liked it enough to get married."

The couple's wedding reception took place at the Four Seasons restaurant. Mr. McCormick and Mr. Phelps were in attendance.

Reached at Moto, which is located on Division Street beneath the elevated J and M subway tracks, Mr. McCormick said that he and his partner saw a cut of the movie a couple of weeks ago. "I enjoyed it," he said, though he added: "It was painful to watch and to relive the whole thing again."

Moto has been open about 10 weeks now, and Mr. McCormick said business was "pretty good" and "getting stronger," and that the restaurant had already expanded its menu beyond panini and salads to "roasted lamb with roasted tomatoes and potatoes, and porchetta stuffed with fennel, garlic, oregano and other ingredients."

When asked if his restaurant's finances had reached a point where they could estimate when Moto might break even, Mr. McCormick gave a little laugh. "That's going to be like a whole other full-time job," he said. "We have to sit down with some professionals É and try to figure out a plan on how to right ourselves and begin to keep up."

As for the state of his friendship with Mr. Phelps, who contributed the lion's share of the money for Moto, Mr. McCormick got a little quiet. "It's addressed every couple of days how we're going to repair that," he said. "Now that we're open, we're starting to feel that camaraderie return."

Mr. Phelps, who was interviewed separately, noted that he had broken two business taboos-"never open a business with your best friend and never open a business with your own money"-and had lived to tell the tale. All told, he said, he had sunk $170,000 into the project (Mr. McCormick, friends and family contributed as well). "It was the hardest thing I've ever done, and I went against my intuition at moments-but in the end, it turned out to be exactly what we wanted it to be," he said. "We built every square inch of that place ourselves. And one of the things that is noticed about it is the attention to detail and the integrity that is living and breathing in the place. It sounds kind of trite, but that's what we did."

Mr. Phelps also said that he and Mr. McCormick "still are best friends, definitely."

Meanwhile, Mr. Rossi and Ms. Novack are looking for a distributor-paging Fine Line!-and thinking that for their next project, they'd like to follow Al Sharpton's Presidential campaign, which has about the same odds of success as opening a restaurant in New York.

-Frank DiGiacomo

Some local filmmakers are hoping the chance to show off their movies at the Hamptons International Film Festival this week will be their ticket to success. NY1's Roma Torre spoke to some of the participants and filed this story.

"New York, I think, is a city where people come to live out their dreams, and this is a movie that shows two random people doing that. And hopefully it shows it in a way that clicks with the way other people want to do it to," said Andrew Rossi, whose documentary "Eat This New York" follows two best friends who open Moto, a restaurant and bar in Brooklyn. The friends struggle with every problem possible before finally succeeding.

Now Rossi and his wife and fellow producer Kate Novak are hoping for some success of their own, when their documentary premieres at the Hamptons International Film Festival.

"Young filmmakers can have their films discovered by the industry," said festival organizer Stuart Match Suna. "When an independent film doesn't have distribution and wins a prize or gets press recognition, it really helps drive their opportunity to be picked up by a distributor."

First place in the documentary category is worth $10,000, but Novak and Rossi aren't focusing on the purse.

"We're excited about having it premiere there, because it's really a New York story," Novak said. "We feel that the Hamptons Film Festival is a good beginning for it, and I think we are just excited for people to see it."

To meet our next filmmaker, we go from a bar in Williamsburg to a bodega in Washington Heights.

"A big part of the film is the neighborhood," said Alfredo De Villa, whose film is called, aptly enough, "Washington Heights." "It's trying to capture what I think is the essence, the dynamics of neighborhood."

"Washington Heights" is about a son in a Dominican family who must give up his dream of being an illustrator to take over the family bodega when his father is injured in a hold up.

"It's playing up the whole idea of tradition," said De Villa. "There's some aspect of that in everyone's life."

De Villa hopes his film touches the audience at the festival. "You learn a lot about a film through audience response," he said.

The role of the audience, organizers say, is what distinguishes their festival.

"One of the things we are really proud about," said Suna, "is the intimate quality of the Hamptons Festival and the fact that it's international. It really gives the filmmakers the opportunity to interact with the public Ð the audience gets to meet them up close and ask questions. Even Steven Spielberg will be out there dealing with people in an intimate fashion."

The Hamptons Film Film Festival runs from this Wednesday through next Sunday, October 16-20. For more information, go to hamptonsfest.org or call 631-287-0735.