If democracy is a contact sport, then the mayoral race in Newark, New Jersey, was a bare-knuckled, eye-gouging backroom brawl. In one corner is Sharpe James, the incumbent and an old-school civil rights battler; in the other is the young idealist Cory Booker, a Yale-educated sports hero who chooses to live in public housing while serving on the city council. They're both Democrats, so the real battle is old vs. new, upstart vs. machine. Things turn ugly. The camera crew is threatened. Scandal rocks both campaigns. And the finale is white-knuckled even for those who know the results. A recent Academy Award nominee, Street Fight tells a different kind of political story, one minus spin doctors and high-profile TV ads. Two candidates slug it out, and you're in the middle of the action. (DW)

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