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Category Archives: Documentary

Ghost Fleet

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Director Shannon Service, producer Jon Bowermaster.

GHOST FLEET investigates the hidden population of modern-day slaves who underpin industrial fishing, held captive at sea for years at a time.

 

Not In Our Name (2012)

Director: Hazuan Hashim & Phil Maxwell | Producer: Hazuan Hashim & Phil Maxwell
Genre: Documentary | Produced In: 2009 | Story Teller’s Country: United Kingdom

Tags: Conflict, Culture, Europe, Politics, United Kingdom, War

Synopsis: Featuring veteran anti-war campaigner Tony Benn and peace campaigners from around the world, the film examines works by artists in response to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Twelve artists provide a candid analysis of war through their work and take the viewer on a journey that celebrates humanity and the struggle for peace. Shot in 14 different countries including Iraq and the U.S.A., the film subtly contrasts the difference between destruction and creativity. Six years in the making, this truly independent production without any budget has been made possible through collaboration with other film-makers and a passion for peace and humanity.

 
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Posted by on December 22, 2018 in Documentary, Politics, War

 

From Cable Street to Brick Lane (2012)

A non-linear tribute to successive generations of immigrants and trade unionists in London’s East End, and their triumph over prejudice and intolerance.

Archive footage brings to life the 1936 Battle of Cable Street when Irish dockers ran to the aid of Jews, socialists, anarchists and communists whose protest against a march by the British Union of Fascists provoked an attack by the police. Interviewees – including artist Bob & Roberta Smith and writer Rachel Lichtenstein – recall the subsequent struggles of anti-fascists against racial and homophobic violence in the 1970s and 1990s, depicting a vibrant but disparate community united against hate.

 

Austerity Fight (2017)

The austerity policies of the Tories have targeted young and old. The NHS is chronically under funded and is being privatised. Students are leaving college with huge debts. Children, pensioners and the disabled are living in poverty and millions live precarious lives on ‘zero hour contracts’. Austerity Fight challenges the notion that we have to live in a world where public services are cut, worker’s rights removed and poverty is a daily reality for millions. Austerity Fight champions equality, practical alternatives to Austerity and a vision of a world based on co-operation rather than the greed of a global super elite.

 

Nae Passaran

| DocumentaryAnimationHistory | 4 March 2018 (UK)

In a Scottish town in 1974, factory workers refuse to carry out repairs on warplane engines in an act of solidarity against the violent military coup in Chile. Four years pass before the engines, left to rust in factory yard, mysteriously disappear in the middle of the night.

website

 

Unsung Hero: The Jack Jones Story

Documentary film on former Transport & General Union (UK) General Secretary Jack Jones, a man who exercised more power over government economic policy than any other trades union leader in British history.

Jones took on four of the great evils of modern times: poverty, fascism, worker exploitation and pensioner poverty – and took them on with so much conviction that at one point, the public voted him the most powerful man in Britain.

The life of Jack Jones mirrors the story of the 20th century – a man whose like we may never see again.

Roy Boulter, Hurricane Films, roy@hurricanefilms.co.uk

 

 

A Strike and an Uprising (in Texas)

The bulk is oral history of these 2 incredible stories, one is the pecan
shellers strike of 10,000 led by iconic communist leader, Emma Tenayuca. The
other is and uprising in Nacogdoches of African American women who were
totally exploited by the state university there. Most surprising, both were
victories, at least for a little while.

These stories are strongly tied to the present including:
1. the MLK day parade in San Antonio with a jet flyover from the local
airforce base.
2. a tour of Confederate statues and the plaque for education of children of
the Confederacy at the Texas Capitol
3. a Juneteenth emancipation parade in Nacogdoches which includes prisoners
from the local jail
4. the Texas Tea Party with Attorney General Dan Patrick

AND it ends with the removal of the Jefferson Davis statue at UT.
Along with quotes from Marx, Benjamin, Gramsci, and Wallers

Here’s the trailer: https://vimeo.com/233255834

Here’s the whole piece: https://vimeo.com/230770743
Password: su

In solidarity,
Anne

 
 

From the Land of Gandhi

2019; 49min

Director: Prakash Wadhwa
prakash.wadhwa@gmail.com

A story of 4 high-skilled immigrants from India, a decade after they came to study in the United States, which places a human face to high-skilled immigration. The film also highlights the need for reforming America’s legal immigration at a time of intense globalization and retirement of the baby boomers.

Genres Documentary, Special Interest
Director Prakash Wadhwa
Starring Richard B. Freeman, Vivek Wadhwa, Jacob Kirkegaard

 

Backpack Full of Cash

a film that explores the growing privatization of public schools and the resulting impact on America’s most vulnerable children.

 

Complicit

Complicit is about migrant workers in China. Journey of Chinese factory migrant worker-turned-activist Yi Yeting, who takes his fight against the global electronic industry from his hospital bed to the international stage. While battling his own work-induced leukemia, Yi Yeting teaches himself labour law and joins the struggle to defend the lives of teenage workers poisoned by toxic working conditions in the making of smartphones.

But defending the lives of millions of Chinese workers from becoming terminally ill due to working conditions necessitates confrontation with some of the world’s largest brands including Apple and Samsung….

Heather White, Producer/Co-Director
heatherhsw@gmail.com

“A Harrowing, Powerful Look at the Real Price of Our Devices”

REVIEWS:
POV: “As one gazes into the screen and taps one’s thumbs on the keyboard icons, one grasps one’s involvement and complicity in a major human rights issue. Even reviewing the film, staring at a screen on a laptop, feels uncomfortably inappropriate and ironic after viewing this compelling documentary.”
http://povmagazine.com/articles/view/review-complicit

The Reel Word: “Complicit is a harrowing and powerful documentary that may be set in fast developing China, but it raises an ethical question that we should all consider: From the smartphones we swipe to the Fitbits we wear, what really happens along the supply chain? Directors Heather White and Lynn Zhang make audiences face the uncomfortable truth that there is a devastating human cost to the conveniences we enjoy on a daily basis.”

THE REEL SCORE: 10/10
https://www.thereelword.net/complicit-documentary-review-china-2017/0/

Film Doo: “COMPLICIT is a shattering comment on inequality and the forces that work to maintain the unjust status-quo.”
https://www.filmdoo.com/blog/2017/03/08/review-complicit-2017/

Faze: “Complicit, A Shocking Film On Global Outsourcing Featured At Human Rights Watch Film Festival”

‘Complicit’ A Shocking Film On Global Outsourcing Featured At Human Rights Watch Film Festival

Toronto Globe and Mail: “In this year’s festival, the most complex film to assess was Complicit, a doc about Chinese activists struggling to help factory workers poisoned by the chemicals used to make cellphones and computers. In that instance, Human Rights Watch had to call on the expertise of three different departments: its China division; the health division; and the business division.”
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/film/human-rights-watch-film-festival-critically-curates-documentaries/article34400377/

The Platform: “Complicit…forces one to ponder how much a life is truly worth in our profit obsessed world.”
http://www.the-platform.org.uk/2017/03/25/film-nights-for-human-rights-complicit/

PressReader: “Complicit reveals the human costs of global outsourcing while highlighting the choices made by a group of inspired activists seeking change.”
https://www.pressreader.com/canada/the-globe-and-mail-metro-ontario-edition/20170324/282535838196685

In The Seats: “Complicit is pointed exploration into the various levels of corporate and governmental corruption impacting China’s manufacturing industry. Aiming to inspire consumers to stand up and demand better from corporations, Complicit is a film worth putting our electronics down for.

Human Rights Watch Festival 2017: Our Review of ‘Complicit’


The Georgia Straight: “Complicit reveals the inhumane ways in which hopeful, hardworking citizens are exposed to toxic chemicals on the job and the shady attempts by multi-billion-dollar corporations to shed all responsibility. The result is equal parts devastating, gut-wrenching, and infuriating—a necessary call for westerners to re-evaluate their relationship with capitalism and its astronomical cost.