Directed by: Barbara Kopple
Running Time: 103 min
Starring: Norman Yarborough, Houston Elmore, Phil Sparks
Website: N/a
Synopsis: A filmed account of a bitterly violent miner strike.
Category Archives: Occupation/Type of Work
Harlan County USA (1976)
Bringing It All Back Home
Directed by: Chrissie Stansfield
Running Time: 48 min
Starring: N/a
Website: N/a
Synopsis: This fascinating documentary analyzes how the patterns of international capital investment and the exploitation of Third World women workers in free trade zones are being brought home to the First World. Issues discussed include: the internationalization of local economies, the growing schism between the rich and poor and the changing nature of women’s work.
Brandworkers May Day Campaign Video (2015)
Directed by: Des Almoradie
Running Time: 5 min
Starring: N/a
Website: N/a
Synopsis: This short documentary sheds crucial light on the harsh realities faced by food factory workers who toil behind the scenes of the so-called sustainable food movement. While people enjoy the growth of sustainable food produced in the five boroughs including artisanal bread, hummus, and much more, tragically, like so many aspects of the food system and economy, the great promise of local food is being undermined by the serious mistreatment of low-income immigrant workers.
Boom, Bust, Boom (2016)
Directed by: Bill Jones & Terry Jones & Ben Timlett
Running Time: 75 min
Starring: N/a
Website: N/a
Synopsis: The result of a meeting between writer, director, historian and Python Terry Jones and economics professor and entrepreneur Theo Kocken. Co-written by Jones and Kocken and featuring John Cusack, Nobel Prize winners Daniel Kahneman, Robert J. Shiller and Paul Krugman, the film is part of a global movement to change the economic system through education to protect the world from boom and bust. A unique look at why economic crashes happen, Boom Bust Boom is a multimedia documentary combining live action with animation and puppetry to explain economics to everyone.
At Any Price (2012)
Directed by: Ramin Bahrani
Running Time: 105 min
Starring: N/A
Website: N/a
Synopsis: A farming family’s business is threatened by an unexpected crisis, further testing the relationship between a father and his rebellious son.
A Piece of the Dream: Amanda (2015)
Directed by: Darian Henry
Running Time: 6 min
Starring: N/A
Website: N/a
Synopsis: Amanda, a single mother of two, speaks passionately on her active role in the Fight For $15. The film also explores her retelling of the unfair treatment she received working at both McDonalds and Dunkin Donuts along with the current struggles she faces raising her sons and living on minimum wage in Albany NY.
Who is Dayani Cristal (2013)
Directed by: Marc Silver
Running Time: 1hr 25 min
Starring: N/A
Website: http://whoisdayanicristal.com/
Synopsis: An anonymous body in the Arizona desert sparks the beginning of a real-life human drama. The search for identity leads us back across a continent to seek out the people left behind and the meaning of a mysterious tattoo.
Strike (Eisenstein) 100th anniv of Russian Revolution
Directed by: Sergei M. Esenstein
Running Time: 1 hr 22 min
Starring: N/A
Website: N/a
Synopsis: A group of oppressed factory workers go on strike in pre-revolutionary Russia.
Sacco and Vanzetti (2007)
Directed by: Peter Miller
Running Time: 1 hr 34 min
Starring: N/A
Website: http://www.montereymedia.com/nogodnomaster/
Synopsis: The story of two Italian immigrant radicals who were executed in 1927 offers insights into present-day issues of civil liberties and the rights of immigrants.
Rough Side Of The Mountain (1999)
Directed by: Anne Lewis
Running Time: 57 min
Starring: N/A
Website: https://www.appalshop.org/store/appalshop-films/rough-side-of-the-mountain/
Synopsis: Over the past twenty years, manufacturing plants and mining companies have closed throughout rural America, often leaving behind communities with crumbling infrastructures, widespread unemployment, and inexperience in self-governance. Such was the case in two hard hit southwest Virginia towns Trammel and Ivanhoe. In 1986 Trammel attracted national attention as the privately owned town whose 50 homes, company store, post office, and water and cable systems were put on the auction block. Rough Side of the Mountain follows the story as local residents, mostly unemployed and disabled, organized with the help of churches and foundations to purchase the auctioned homes and save their town. In Ivanhoe, the program profiles the efforts of the Ivanhoe Civic League as community members attempt to rebuild after the loss of two major industries, the school, and local businesses. Rough Side of the Mountain looks at grassroots community organizing and the steel ceiling encountered by many poor rural communities as they struggle to develop new economies in an increasingly global system.
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