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Category Archives: Drama

Quilombo (1986)

26 Apr

119; Brazil

Director: Carlos Diegues

Cast:  Jonas Bloch, Zózimo Bulbul and Emmanuel Cavalcanti

Synopsis (IMDB): Palmares is a 17th-century quilombo, a settlement of escaped slaves in northeast Brazil. In 1650, plantation slaves revolt and head for the mountains where they find others led by the aged seer, Acotirene. She anoints one who becomes Ganga Zumba, a legendary king. For years, his warriors hold off Portuguese raiders; then he agrees to leave the mountains in exchange for reservation land and peace. It’s a mistake. Zumbi, a warrior whose mother was killed by Portuguese and who spent 15 years with the Whites, stays in the mountains to lead Palmares. In 1694, the Portuguese import a ruthless captain from São Paulo to lead an assault on the free Blacks. Can Zumbi keep Palmares free?

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Blacks, Drama, Labor History, Slavery

 

Rabia (2009)

26 Apr

89m; Mexico

Director: Sebastián Cordero

Synopsis: A romantic thriller about a construction worker in hiding for killing his foreman who hides in the mansion where his girlfriend works as a maid.

Contact: Esther Devos edevos@wildbunch.eu

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Construction Trades, Crime-Action, Drama, Service Workers, Working Class

 

Raices (1955)

26 Apr

85m; Mexico

Director: Benito Alizraki

Synopsis: Four independent stories based on writer Francisco Rojas Gonzáles’s work, depicting the reality of Mexican indian people

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Drama, Migrant workers

 

Raining Stones (1993)

26 Apr

90m; U.K.

Director: Ken Loach

Cast: Bruce Jones, Julie Brown and Gemma Phoenix

Synopsis: The story of a man devoted to his family and his religion. Proud, though poor, Bob wants his little girl to have a beautiful (and costly) brand-new dress for her First Communion. His stubbornness and determination get him into trouble as he turns to more and more questionable measures, in his desperation to raise the needed money. This tragic flaw leads him to risk all that he loves and values, his beloved family, indeed even his immortal soul and salvation, in blind pursuit of that goal.

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Drama, Working Class

 

A Raisin in the Sun (1961)

26 Apr

128m; U.S.

Director: Daniel Petrie

Cast: Sidney Poitier, Claudia McNeil and Ruby Dee

Synopsis (IMDB): Film based on the play by  Lorraine Hansberry.  Walter Lee Younger is a young man struggling with his station in life. Sharing a tiny apartment with his wife, son, sister and mother, he seems like an imprisoned man. Until, that is, the family gets an unexpected financial windfall…

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Blacks, Drama, Working Class

 

La Raison du Plus Faible (2006)

26 Apr

116m; France

Director: Lucas Belvaux

Cast: Eric Caravaca, Lucas Belvaux and Claude Semal

Synopsis: Laid-off French steelworkers turn to crime. Explores frustrations of men who find themselves no longer useful members of society but takes a fatal turn into a robbery/thriller and deteriorates into pointless violence.

Contact:  almost forgot to mention one film (an excellent fit!!): LA RAISON DU PLUS FAIBLE, by Lucas Belvaux. It is distributed in the US, but there’s no print for now, but there should be one for the fall. You can contact Wendy Lidell on my behalf if you don’t know her at International Film Circuit: 212.777.5690 or wlidell@infc.us. If she doesn’t have a print by then, I might be able to get one from France. – I almost forgot to mention one film (an excellent fit!!): LA RAISON DU PLUS FAIBLE, by Lucas Belvaux. It is distributed in the US, but there’s no print for now, but there should be one for the fall. You can contact Wendy Lidell on my behalf if you don’t know her at International Film Circuit: 212.777.5690 or wlidell@infc.us. If she doesn’t have a print by then, I might be able to get one from France.

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Crime-Action, Drama, Industrial/Mine/Manufacturing, Unemployment-Wages

 

Ramparts of Clay (1971)

26 Apr

80m; France

Director: Jean-Louis Bertuccelli

Cast: Leila Shenna, Kricheche and Jean-Louis Trintignant

Synopsis (IMDB): In 1962, change comes to a Tunisian village on the edge of the Sahara. An entrepreneur sets up a salt mine, hiring village men. When he pays only half the wages agreed upon, they sit down in a field of rocks. The boss calls the army, who encircle the strikers. The women watch, sacrifice a sheep, pray, ululate. During the second night, a young woman hides the bucket and rope of the town’s well to keep water from the army. The strike galvanizes her: she’s learning to read and has studied a city woman who visits the village. Now, as she removes her traditional dress and rejects a ritual to cast out her new rebellious spirit, will she gain independence as did Tunisia and the strikers

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Drama, Organizing, Strikes-Strikebreaking-Lockouts, Women

 

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Rapt (2009)

26 Apr

125m; France

Director: Lucas Belvaux

Cast: Yvan Attal, Anne Consigny and André Marcon

Synopsis: Stanislaff Graff, a rich industrialist and jetsetting playboy with a wife and a lover, is snatched by kidnappers who demand a fifty million euro ransom. The main question for his board is whether his life is worth more than twenty million. Based on a true story. Told entirely from the industrialist’s point of view, there’s really nothing here about work or workers, and even the question about what a life is worth is not explored much or well. While it’s barely hinted that the kidnappers may be disgruntled workers, this too is left unexplored.

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Crime-Action, Drama, White Collar

 

Ratcatcher (1999)

26 Apr

94m; U.K.

Director: Lynne Ramsay

Cast: Tommy Flanagan, Mandy Matthews and William Eadie

Synopsis (IMDB): Glasgow, summer, 1973. Dustmen are striking; bags of garbage add to the blight of council flats and a fetid canal. Ryan, who’s about 12, drowns during a play fight with his neighbor, the jug-eared James. James runs home, a flat where he lives with his often-drunk da, his ma, and sisters, who live in hope of moving to newly-built council flats. The slice-of-life, coming-of-age story follows James as he tags along with the older lads; has a friendship with his quirky wee rodent-loving neighbor, Kenny; spends time with Margaret Anne, myopic, slightly older, the local sexual punching bag; and, has a moment or two of joy. The strike may end, but is there any way out for James?

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Children, Drama, Strikes-Strikebreaking-Lockouts

 

Raven’s End (1963)

26 Apr

101m; Sweden

Director: Bo Widerberg

Cast: Thommy Berggren, Keve Hjelm and Emy Storm

Synopsis: Portrait of working class youth. Portrays family life in Malmo, Sweden in 1930s, tracing relations between an adolescent boy and his father.

 
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Posted by on April 26, 2012 in Children, Drama, Working Class

 
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