Drama | THE LABOR FILM DATABASE

James’ Journey to Jerusalem (2003)

91m; Israel

Cast: Siyabonga Melongisi Shibe, Salim Dau and Arieh Elias

Synopsis (Wikipedia): The film’s plot focuses on an African teenager named James (Siyabonga Melongisi Shibe) whom hails from the fictional African village Entshongweni, who goes on a pilgrimage journey, on behalf of his village, towards the Holy Land, Israel, and especially in order to come to Jerusalem. Upon arriving in Israel, James is suspected to be an illegal foreign worker and as a result he is arrested. Shimi (Salim Daw), a contractor of foreign workers, releases him on bail to work with him. After James explains to him that he did not travel to Israel to work, Shimi clarifies to him that since he paid for his release, James now owes him. Therefore James is forced to interrupt his journey and begin working for Shimi.

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Posted by Metro Council on March 23, 2012 in Drama, Immigrants/Immigration, Service Workers

I Am Cuba (1964)

19 Mar

141m; U.S.S.R.-Cuba

Director: Mikhail Kalatozov

Cast: Sergio Corrieri, Salvador Wood and José Gallardo

Synopsis (IMDB): Four vignettes in Batista’s Cuba dramatize the need for revolution; long, mobile shots tell almost wordless stories. In Havana, Maria faces shame when a man who fancies her discovers how she earns her living. Pedro, an aging peasant, is summarily told that the land he farms has been sold to United Fruit. A university student faces down a crowd of swaggering U.S. sailors and then watches friends shot by police when they try to distribute a pro-Castro leaflet. The war arrives on the doorstep of peasants Mariano, Amelia, and their four children when Batista’s forces bomb the hills. Mariano wants peace, so he seeks out the guerrillas to join the fight. If nothing else, an incredible example of pure film-making with stunning and innovative camera work.

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Posted by Metro Council on March 19, 2012 in Drama, Farm & Food, Global Economy, Organizing, Politics, Strikes-Strikebreaking-Lockouts, War, Working Class

I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932)

19 Mar

92m; U.S.

Director: Mervyn LeRoy

Cast: Paul Muni, Glenda Farrell and Helen Vinson

Synopsis: Wrongly convicted James Allen serves in the intolerable conditions of a southern chain gang, which later comes back to haunt him.

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Posted by Metro Council on March 19, 2012 in A: Highly Recommended Labor Films, Drama, Working Class

I Can Get It For You Wholesale (1951)

19 Mar

91m; U.S.

Director: Michael Gordon

Cast: Susan Hayward, Dan Dailey and George Sanders

Synopsis (IMDB): A ruthless fashion designer steps on everyone in her way in order to reach the top of her profession. Eventually she is forced to choose between her ambition and the man she loves.

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Posted by Metro Council on March 19, 2012 in Drama, Romance, White Collar, Women, Working Class

ILLEGAL (Illégal) [2010]

19 Mar

95m; Belgium/Luxembourg/France

Director: Olivier Masset-Depasse

Synopsis: “[A] fascinating study of perseverance in the face of subhuman treatment.” –Boyd Van Hoeij, Variety. Tania (Anne Coesens), a Russian immigrant living illegally in Belgium, is willing to do whatever it takes to prevent her son and herself from being deported. When Tania’s illegal status is discovered, she is arrested and sent to a detention center, where she meets other illegals like herself, struggling to stay in their adopted homeland. Things soon spiral out of control when she claims a false name and finds herself in the middle of a complex deportation situation. Winner, Society of Dramatic Actors and Composers’ SACD Prize, 2010 Cannes Directors’ Fortnight.

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Posted by Metro Council on March 19, 2012 in Children, Drama, Immigrants/Immigration, Women, Working Class

Ikiru (1952)

19 Mar

143m; Japan

Director: Akira Kurosawa

Synopsis: Kanji Watanabe is a longtime bureaucrat in a city office who, along with the rest of the office, spends his entire working life doing nothing. He finds that he has a terminal cancer and decides to intensively live his last months of life.

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Posted by Metro Council on March 19, 2012 in Drama, Public Sector, Working Class

In Good Company (2004)

19 Mar

109m; U.S.

Director: Paul Weitz

Cast: Dennis Quaid, Topher Grace and Scarlett Johansson

Synopsis: A middle-aged ad exec is faced with a new boss who’s nearly half his age… and who also happens to be sleeping with his daughter.

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Posted by Metro Council on March 19, 2012 in Comedy, Drama, White Collar

In This World (2002)

19 Mar

88m; U.K

Director: Michael Winterbottom

Cast: Jamal Udin Torabi, Enayatullah and Imran Paracha

Synopsis: In February 2002 in the Shamshatoo Refugee Camp in the North West Frontier Province in Pakistan, there are 53,000 refugees living in sub-human conditions since 1979 with the Soviet Union invasion and 2001 with the USA bombing and invasion of Afghanistan. The family of the Afghan Enayat and his cousin Jamal decides to send them illegally to London to have a better life. They hire coyotes to smuggle the cousins through Iran and Turkey to Italy and finally London hidden inside trucks and containers. However, the long journey locked in a container with other families separates the cousins and on 09 August 2002, Jamal has his asylum application refused in London.

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Posted by Metro Council on March 19, 2012 in Drama, Immigrants/Immigration

In the Beginning / A l’origine (2009)

19 Mar

155m; France

Director: Xavier Giannoli

Synopsis: France, present day. A professional conman passes himself off as the boss of a construction site building a highway extension. He cons the whole region, hires dozens of workers and cynically enjoys the profits of his scam until he meets the lady mayor of a small village that the road will go through. She intrigues and unsettles him, before revealing to him a world he never knew: feelings. How far will he go now to save his victims and save himself from his own lies?

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Posted by Metro Council on March 19, 2012 in Construction Trades, Drama, Working Class