RSS

Category Archives: 2020 Shortlist

Gone Postal

16 Feb

Jay Galione, son of a postal worker, investigates the dark corners of the U.S. Postal Service. Across the country, brave employees stand up to injustice on the job and fight to Save the People’s Post Office. A moving indictment of the toxic culture and push to downsize, this eye-opening documentary allows viewers to hear from experts and advocates including Ralph Nader and Richard Wolff, and directly from the selfless and courageous people hidden behind the scenes, long suffering and ignored.

2020
Directed by Jay Galione

Film website

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on February 16, 2021 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added

 

The Price of Free (Kailash)

05 Oct

Kailash (original title)

1h 32min | Documentary | 2 November 2018 (USA)

The story of how Kailash Satyarthi launched a built a global movement to rescue children from slavery.

WEBSITE

Entire film available online here

Initial release: January 18, 2018
Director: Derek Doneen
Cast: Kailash Satyarthi, Bhuwan Ribhu, Sumedha, Arshad Mehdi, Asmita Satyarthi, Swati Jha
Music composed by: Daniel Bensi, Saunder Jurriaans
Story by: Derek Doneen, Davis Guggenheim
Producers: Davis Guggenheim, Sarah Anthony
 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Children, Documentary, Slavery, Streaming Online (Youtube, Vimeo)

 

Bitter Money

05 Oct

2016 ‧ Documentary ‧ 2h 43m

Migrants come to the city of East China looking for a better life, but instead find few opportunities and poor living conditions that create violence and oppression.

Initial release: September 9, 2016
Director: Wang Bing
Screenplay: Wang Bing
Cast: Ling Ling, Huang Lei
Awards: Orizzonti Award for Best Screenplay
Nominations: Orizzonti Award for Best Actor, Orizzonti Award for Best Actress

‘Bitter Money’ and ‘Bitter Rice’: Migrant Workers Face Toil and Trouble

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Cities-Urban, Communism/Socialism, Documentary, Farm & Food, Immigrants/Immigration, Migrant workers

 

Life on the Line

05 Oct

2015 ‧ Drama/Action ‧ 1h 37m

After a family tragedy, Beau Ginner rises to be foreman in a Texas lineman team, upgrading overhead power cables and preventing disasters. However, there is friction when his college-bound niece Bailey’s on-off boyfriend Duncan joins the crew, while another new recruit is hiding PTSD symptoms.

Release date: 2016 (USA)
Director: David Hackl
Music composed by: Jeff Toyne
Executive producers: Chad Dubea, Rosa Morris Peart, Shawn Williamson, Bryant Pike, Jamie Goehring
Producers: Phillip Glasser, Marvin Peart

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/18/movies/life-on-the-line-review-john-travolta-kate-bosworth.html

https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/life-on-the-line-2016

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Construction Trades, Drama, Safety & Health, Streaming Online (Youtube, Vimeo), Working Class

 

Nightcaller

05 Oct

Director: Alexander Humilde
2018; 6m

“In the urban jungle of Manila, the call centre capital of the world, anonymous call centre agents from Manila spill the beans on the Philippines’ most in-demand job. Their stories reveal prevalent truths about the effects of rapid westernization, all of which take place just on the other side of our phone calls.”

Alexander Humilde’s Nightcaller documentary debuts on Air Canada flights

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Documentary, Global Economy, Service Workers, Technology

 

System Error

05 Oct

2018 ‧ Documentary ‧ 1h 36m

“System Error” seeks answers to the great contradictions of our time and makes it clear why, despite everything, everything continues as before. The film shows the world from the perspective of people fascinated by the possibilities of capitalism. Whether European financial strategists, American hedge fund managers or Brazilian meat producers: They cannot, must not or do not even want to imagine a world without an expanding economy.

A humorous personal and essay film addressing architecture, habitation, space, density, xenophobia, gentrification and urban development. A power struggle between mountain peasants who have been raising milk cows on common land and a village bailiff trying to gain power driving them off the land.

Initial release: May 10, 2018 (Germany)
Director: Florian Opitz
Screenplay: Florian Opitz
Cinematography: Andy Lehmann
Producers: Florian Opitz, Jan Krüger

WEBSITE

livia@icarusfilms.com
718-488-8900

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Big Business/Corporations, Communism/Socialism, Documentary, Farm & Food, Finance, Global Economy, Philosophy, Technology

 

Time Thieves

05 Oct

2018 ‧ Documentary ‧ 1h 25m

A look at the puzzle of “time poverty,” which equates to the more people try to save time, the less they seem to have of it.

Initial release: 2018
Director: Cosima Dannoritzer
Screenplay: Cosima Dannoritzer
Producers: Christian Popp, Carles Brugueras, Marieke van den Bersselaar

livia@icarusfilms.com 718-488-8900

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Automation, Big Business/Corporations, Communism/Socialism, Documentary, Slavery, Technology

 

Mine 9

05 Oct

2019 ‧ Drama ‧ 1h 23m

Miners struggle to survive after an explosion leaves them trapped two miles underground.

Release date: April 12, 2019 (USA)
Director: Eddie Mensore
Music composed by: Mauricio Yazigi
Producer: Eddie Mensore
Screenplay: Eddie Mensore

‘Mine 9’ Review: A Tense Disaster Drama, Undermined by Clichés

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Drama, Industrial/Mine/Manufacturing, Safety & Health, Working Class

 

Solidarity

05 Oct

Solidarity-FILM-2019

Film about the construction industry blacklist in the UK.

Directed by Lucy Parker
2019; 75 mins

SOLIDARITY is about the secretive methods used against UK activists and trade unionists. Blacklisted construction workers and activists spied on by the police share their ongoing struggles.

Blacklisting in the UK construction industry impacted thousands of workers who were labelled ‘troublemakers’ for speaking out and secretively denied employment. Activists uncovered alarming links between workplace blacklisting and undercover policing.  SOLIDARITY attentively follows meetings between activists and law students, brought together for the film, revealing the determination of a community working together to find a route to justice.

The first feature length film from artist filmmaker Lucy Parker, Solidarity has been made alongside and features members of Blacklist Support Group, core participants in Undercover Policing Inquiry, and members of other campaigning groups including  Voice of Domestic Workers, Cleaners and Allied Independent Workers Union, Independent Workers of Great Britain, GMB, RMT, Unite British Airways Mixed Fleet, County Durham Teaching Assistants, BECTU Picturehouse and many individual trade unionists.

Funded by Arts Council England, Barry Amiel & Norman Melburn Trust, Lipman Miliband Trust, Kingston University and donations from trade union branches and individuals.

Info and a trailer here: https://vimeo.com/331182945

WEBSITE
CONTACT INFO
City Projects
46 Brookbys’s Walk, London, E9 6DA
0781 306 2595

www.cityprojects.org

Email: info@cityprojects.org
Twitter: @solidarity_film

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Construction Trades, Discrimination: Racism, Sexism, etc, Documentary, Organizing, Working Class

 

Made in Bangladesh

05 Oct

2019 ‧ Drama ‧ 1h 30m

Made in Bangladesh is a 2019 Bangladeshi drama film directed by Rubaiyat Hossain. It was screened in the Contemporary World Cinema section at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival.

Initial release: September 6, 2019
Director: Rubaiyat Hossain
Language: Bengali language

‘Made in Bangladesh’: Film Review | TIFF 2019

Notes by Steve Cook, President, Washington Baltimore News Guild; cookstevend@gmail.com
Tells the story of a garment worker who decides to organize her coworkers into a union after a fire kills her best friend. The young woman, Shimu, has to overcome skepticism from her coworkers, resistance from her husband, double-crossing from a coworker, pressure from her bosses, bureaucratic inertia from the government, and a host of obstacles like we all face.
I want everyone in my shop and other open shops to see this movie. It really lays out what we all face in organizing, but the stakes are clear as day in a way that it often is difficult to communicate to our units. It would be great if it were available in DVDs, so locals could show it, or people could share it in their homes, or pass it around.
The film also highlights the universal struggles unions face anywhere in the world. The things I described above are things we face in our own organizing efforts. I also took away a message of solidarity with working people regardless of their nationality, geographic location, gender, or ethnicity. Their struggle is our struggle. These are messages that people must hear again and again. Cameron Bailey, the TIFF artistic director called Shimu, “the Norma Rae we need now.”
This movie has distribution in France starting Dec. 5 though an outfit called Pyramide International, which TIFF lists as the international sale agent. As far as I know, no one has picked it up in North America. I think it would be ideal for the DC Labor Filmfest, but also would be great if it could get exposure in North America in the meantime. If you have connections in the distribution industry, perhaps you could spread awareness of the movie among them.
The contact information for Pyramide in the TIFF book are sales@pyramidefilms.com, and 0033142960220.
I also am including some links that give you a fuller idea of what Made in Bangladesh is about. I hope I’ve given enough description of how important I think this movie is. Please feel free to contact me for a fuller description or for any way that I may be able to help.
Steve Cook, President, Washington Baltimore News Guild; cookstevend@gmail.com

https://www.tiff.net/events/made-in-bangladesh

Q&A following the TIFF screening.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPNS4XEoZRU

Pyramide International
http://inter.pyramidefilms.com/pyramidefilms-international-catalogue/made-in-bangladesh.html

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on October 5, 2019 in 2020 Shortlist, A: New/Just Added, Consumerism, Documentary, Global Economy, Manufacturing, Textile Industry, Women

 
← Older posts