The Landlord (2017) Characters, Setting & Themes Explained

The film takes place in Park Slope, a Brooklyn neighborhood in New York City. This urban setting features an inner-city tenement at its center, highlighting tensions between long-time residents and incoming wealth. The area's block-by-block texture, clubs, small businesses, and crowded stairways, anchors the story's social drama and shapes the characters' choices.

• park slope
• brooklyn
• new york city
• tenement
• setting
• urban

Gentrification serves as an engine driving conflict between wealth and community throughout the film. The story explores how redevelopment affects identity, belonging, and neighborhood loyalties. The tenement becomes a site where personal choices collide with urban transformation, as characters navigate the tensions between old residents and new incoming wealth.

• gentrification
• tenement
• urban change
• neighborhood
• class conflict

Elgar Enders is a privileged young man living on an allowance from wealthy parents who purchases a deteriorating tenement in Park Slope. Initially planning to evict the tenants to build a luxury home, he grows fond of the residents and ultimately rebels against his upbringing, choosing to stay and help fix the building while navigating relationships that push him toward responsibility.

• elgar enders
• privileged
• landlord
• tenant
• class

Lanie is a mixed-race dancer at a local black club who faces colorism and social barriers in her daily life. Her light skin and mixed heritage add complexity to her relationship with Elgar. Her resilience anchors Elgar's transformation as he chooses to stay and build a life with her, representing the cultural and racial tensions of the setting.

• lanie
• dancer
• mixed-race
• colorism
• relationship

Fanny Johnson is a tenant in the building who becomes pregnant after an affair with Elgar. She confronts the challenges of motherhood while her husband Copee reacts with anger. Her perspective drives the plot toward considerations of adoption to a white family, ultimately influencing Elgar's decision to take custody and redefine his future.

• fanny johnson
• pregnancy
• tenant
• adoption
• motherhood

Copee is Fanny's husband, a Black activist grappling with identity and anger in the changing neighborhood. He reacts violently upon learning of the pregnancy, attempting to kill Elgar, and is restrained in a straitjacket. His character illustrates the intensity of personal and political tensions in the neighborhood during this period of urban change.

• copee
• activist
• anger
• identity
• conflict

The film uses intimate relationships to explore how love can challenge inherited status and cultural expectations in a segregated society. Elgar's romance with Lanie and his affair with Fanny test the boundaries of race and affection. For Elgar, choosing to stay with the tenants over a life of privilege represents a shift away from WASP norms toward inclusion.

• cross-cultural
• romance
• race
• relationships
• segregation

Elgar struggles to reconcile his WASP upbringing with his new sympathies and partnerships. The film probes how personal identity is shaped by class, race, and loyalty to others. As he navigates love, responsibility, and family, his sense of self shifts toward inclusion rather than exclusion, with societal labels becoming less important than the people around him.

• identity
• class
• race
• self-discovery
• upbringing

Adoption becomes a central plot device as Fanny contemplates giving her child up for adoption to a white family, prompting Elgar to confront fatherhood. The story tracks his growing sense of responsibility and willingness to embrace a non-traditional family. The ending redefines what family can look like when love and loyalty trump social expectations.

• family
• adoption
• fatherhood
• chosen family
• custody

The inner-city tenement serves as more than just a setting, it becomes a symbolic site where personal choices collide with urban transformation. The building represents the tension between old and new, privilege and community. Its deterioration and eventual fate mirror the characters' own transformations and the broader social changes occurring in Park Slope.

• tenement
• building
• symbol
• urban change
• community

While an explicit time period is not provided, the themes of gentrification and the social dynamics described suggest a modern-era setting during a period of rapid urban transformation in Brooklyn. The story reflects contemporary issues of urban change, class tension, and racial dynamics that remain relevant to present-day audiences.

• time period
• era
• modern
• contemporary
• urban change