Jacob Kornbluth, 2013, 89 min
Former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich looks to raise awareness of the country’s widening economic gap.
Category Archives: Genre
Inequality For All (2013)
The Caretaker
7:19m
Theo Rigby/Kate McLean
A short documentary explores the tender relationship between a caretaker who is an undocumented immigrant and an elderly woman in the last months of her life.
The United States of ALEC
A national consortium of state politicians and powerful corporations, ALEC — the American Legislative Exchange Council — presents itself as a “nonpartisan public-private partnership”. But behind that mantra lies a vast network of corporate lobbying and political action aimed to increase corporate profits at public expense without public knowledge…
http://billmoyers.com/episode/full-show-united-states-of-alec-a-follow-up/
Al Jazeera World : Revolution Through Arab Eyes – The Factory
A glimpse into life inside Egypt’s Mahalla textile factory – a place renowned as a cauldron of revolt where striking workers first inspired the Egyptian uprising.
Oil Sands Karaoke (2013)
Canada, 2013
Directed by Charles Wilkinson
Home to one of the most controversial industries in the world—the Athabasca tar sands—Fort McMurray, Alberta, has seen a record population boom. Thousands of men and women from as far away as PEI and Labrador and as close by as local aboriginal communities, have flocked to the city to work in the oil patch, all attracted by the promise of good jobs and a high salary. The work is hard and the hours are long. The weather is harsh and the social life is sparse, and everyone must cope with the knowledge that many people worldwide—possibly even friends and family—object, sometimes strenuously, to what they do for a living. How do they cope? With karaoke of course! Oil Sands Karaoke profiles five Fort McMurray residents as they prepare to unleash their inner divas at Bailey’s, the local pub, in a vocal battle royal.
The Inquiry (2013)
A reconstruction of the Askwith Inquiry, which took place during the 1913 Lock-out in Ireland. It was set up by the British government, supposedly to investigate the origins of the dispute, to resolve the grievances of workers and employers, and to end the strike. William Martin Murphy represented the employers’ side, with Jim Larkin and James Connolly speaking for the workers. The film follows the course of the negotiations and includes Connolly’s famous “Statement of the Workers’ Case.” Askwith reported that the workers had significant grievances, but the employers rejected the inquiry’s recommendations. ¦ Written by Turlough Kelly; directed by Brian Gray. Presented in association with Dublin Community Television.
For full details see link;
http://www.progressivefilmclub.ie/
Into the Fire: The Hidden Victims of Austerity in Greece (2013)
In times of austerity things look bleak for the Greek people; but they’re far worse for those who have recently arrived. Without housing, legal papers, or support, migrants in Greece are faced with increasing and often violent racism at the hands of the growing neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party and the police. Shot and edited with sensitivity and compassion, Into the Fire doesn’t pull its punches, and makes for harrowing viewing in parts. The film gives an insight into the reality faced by people who simply want to lead peaceful, normal lives, and how they are organising to protect themselves. ¦ Directed by Guy Smallman and Kate Mara. Presented in association with Anti-Fascist Action Ireland.
Red Metal: The Copper Country Strike of 1913
By NEIL GENZLINGER in The New York Times
Published: December 16, 2013
This has been a year of notable 50th anniversaries, but time didn’t begin in 1963. A sorrowful PBS documentary on Tuesday night notes the 100th anniversary of an event forgotten by much of the country but not by the people of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula: a miners’ strike that led to a catastrophic stampede in which 73 people died, most of them children.
The program, “Red Metal: The Copper Country Strike of 1913,” is fairly generic as documentaries go, but in an age of battles over the minimum wage and concern about the distribution of wealth, it resonates. An organizing effort by the Western Federation of Miners led miners in and around Calumet to strike in July, and the companies (the Calumet and Hecla Mining Company was the biggest) were unyielding.
Wages — $3 a day — were an issue, and so was a new one-man drilling machine. Previously miners had worked in pairs, and they saw the new technology as both costing jobs and increasing risk in an already dangerous profession, since without a partner an injured miner could go without aid for hours.
At first the workers and their families plunged into the strike with an enthusiasm that is seldom seen in today’s more timid labor groups, and women took an uncharacteristically vocal role, partly in the hope that company enforcers wouldn’t beat them the way they were beating their husbands.
“These women would be out there shouting rude things that women shouldn’t be saying,” notes Alison K. Hoagland, a historian. “They would dip their brooms in the outhouse and smear the strikebreakers with it.”
On Christmas Eve an ugly strike turned far uglier when, at a party for miners’ children in a building known as the Italian Hall, someone — a prankster? a strikebreaker? — yelled fire. There was no fire, but there was a deadly stampede.
Steve Earle sings Woody Guthrie’s “1913 Massacre” to end the film. In a new age of inequality, it feels like both a remembrance and a warning of what happens when opposing sides won’t talk.
Coming For A Visit (On Vient Pour La Visite)
2013 | French | 58 min | HD
| French with English subtitles
Director Lucie Tourette
Undocumented migrants win the battle to get their papers. A historic strike filmed from within.
Paris, 2009. More than 6000 undocumented migrants (sans-papiers) go on strike to demand their legalization. Despite being illegals, Mohamed, Diallo, Hamet and others have worked and paid taxes in France for years in restaurants, cleaning companies, or construction. They have invested all their energy in this battle: now that their status has been disclosed publically, there is no way back.
http://www.vezfilm.org/comingforavisit/
Trailer : http://vimeo.com/53048336
lucie tourette lucie_tourette@yahoo.fr
On The Art Of War
2012, Italy
directed by silvia luzi, luca bellino
Synopsis
Milan, Italy, August 2009.
Four workers climb a 20 metres high gantry crane inside the hangar of the INNSE, the last active factory in Milan. They threaten to throw themselves down to stop the dismantling of the machineries and the closure of the factory they work in. The hangar is surrounded by dozens of policemen and supporters from all over Italy.
It is not a simple struggle.
They have a clear strategy.
They have an organized army.
They know perfectly their territory and their enemy.
There are clear rules, it is a war with a workable paradigm for all forms of struggle.
http://dellartedellaguerra.com/index.php?lang=en
Luca Bellino tfilm.luca@gmail.com
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