104m; U.S.
Director: Martin Ritt
Cast: Jane Fonda, Robert De Niro and Swoosie Kurtz
Synopsis (IMDB): An illiterate cook at a company cafeteria tries for the attention of a newly widowed woman. As they get to know one another, she discovers his inability to read. When he is fired, she takes on trying to teach him to read in her kitchen each night.
110m; U.K.
Director: Carol Reed
Cast: Michael Redgrave, Margaret Lockwood and Edward Rigby
Synopsis (IMDB): Davey Fenwick leaves his mining village on a university scholarship intent on returning to better support the miners against the owners. But he falls in love with Jenny who gets him to marry her and return home as local schoolteacher before finishing his degree. Davey finds he is ill-at-ease in his role, the more so when he realises Jenny still loves her former boyfriend. When he finds that his father and the other miners are going to have to continue working on a possibly deadly coal seam he decides to act.
95m; U.S.
Director: Brian Jun
Cast: Jamie Anne Allman, Raymond J. Barry and Kristian Best
Synopsis (IMDB): Steel City is a stirring family drama from the heartland of America about pride, remorse and forgiveness. When Carl Lee is involved in a fatal car accident he finds himself behind bars, cut off from his life and alienated by his family. His youngest son PJ, confused by life without his dad, is the only person to visit him. While PJ’s girlfriend stays lovingly by his side and his Uncle Vic extends a helping hand, a belligerent older brother and the reality of being on his own force PJ to grow up faster than he’d like. It’s not until a devastating secret is revealed that the family reunites and a regretful father learns that you can never take back the past, but you can let go of it.
Director: John Szostek
Synopsis: Play depicting life in the steel mill.
113m; U.S.
Director: Kimberly Peirce
Cast: Ryan Phillippe, Abbie Cornish and Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Synopsis (IMDB): Decorated Iraq war hero Sgt. Brandon King makes a celebrated return to his small Texas hometown following his tour of duty. He tries to resume the life he left behind. Then, against Brandon’s will, the Army orders him back to duty in Iraq, which upends his world. The conflict tests everything he believes in: the bond of family, the loyalty of friendship, the limits of love and the value of honor.
83m; U.S.
Director: Rick Carrier
Cast: Robert Gentile, Camilo Delgado and Rosita De Triano
Synopsis: Puerto Ricans in New York’s barrio. The boy is beaten by a gang and loses his job; the girl is raped by her employer and becomes a prostitute.
101m; Australia
Director: Richard Lowenstein
Cast: Chris Haywood, Carol Burns and Hugh Keays-Byrne
Synopsis: The first real coal-miners strike in 1930’s Australia told through the struggles of Agnes and Wattie Doig, two lovable rogue characters. Lowenstein’s approach is simple and effective with a documentary feel about it. A leftist film worth marching for.
103m; France
Director: Euzhan Palcy
Cast: Garry Cadenat, Darling Légitimus and Douta Seck
Synopsis (IMDB): Martinique, in the early 1930s. Young José and his grandmother live in a small village. Nearly everyone works cutting cane and barely earning a living. The overseer can fine a worker for the smallest infraction. The way to advance is to do well in school. José studies hard and succeeds in an exam allowing him to attend school in the capital. With only a partial scholarship, the tuition is very costly. José and his grandmother move to Fort-de-France to make José’s studies easier.
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