163m; U.S.
Director: D.W. Griffith
Synopsis (IMDB): The story of a poor young woman, separated by prejudice from her husband and baby, is interwoven with tales of intolerance from throughout history.
62m
Director: Loretta Alper
Synopsis (Media Education Foundation): Based on the forthcoming book by Pepi Leistyna, Class Dismissed navigates the steady stream of narrow working class representations from American television’s beginnings to today’s sitcoms, reality shows, police dramas, and daytime talk shows.
Featuring interviews with media analysts and cultural historians, this documentary examines the patterns inherent in TV’s disturbing depictions of working class people as either clowns or social deviants — stereotypical portrayals that reinforce the myth of meritocracy. :
Website: http://www.mediaed.org/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=411
87m; U.S.
Director: Charlie Chaplin
Cast: Charlie Chaplin, Paulette Goddard and Henry Bergman
Synopsis (IMDB): Chaplin’s last ‘silent’ film, filled with sound effects, was made when everyone else was making talkies. Charlie turns against modern society, the machine age, (The use of sound in films ?) and progress. Firstly we see him frantically trying to keep up with a production line, tightening bolts. He is selected for an experiment with an automatic feeding machine, but various mishaps leads his boss to believe he has gone mad, and Charlie is sent to a mental hospital… When he gets out, he is mistaken for a communist while waving a red flag, sent to jail, foils a jailbreak, and is let out again. We follow Charlie through many more escapades before the film is out.
Trailer
110m; U.S.
Director: Martin Ritt
Cast: Sally Fields, Beau Bridges, Ron Liebman
Synopsis: Sally Fields won an Oscar for Best Actress for her portrayal of a Southern textile worker in the 1970s. Faced with problems and challenges both personal and at work, Norma Rae proves receptive to the message of a union organizer seeking to start a drive at her plant. The film is based on the real story of Crystal Lee Sutton and the ACTWU’s drive to organize JP Stevens’ plants in the South in the 1970s.
Trailer
Key Scene
194m; U.S.
Director: Warren Beatty
Cast: Warren Beatty, Diane Keaton, Edward Hermann, Jerzy Kosinski, Maureen Stapelton, Gene Hackman
Synopsis: Reds is the epic biography of early 20th century U.S. communist author and activist Jack Reed and his stormy off-again, on-again love affair with free-thinker Louise Bryant. The film covers some of Reed’s time in the United States (including relationships with the IWW and the Socialist Party) and their time together in Russia during the Bolshevik revolution which led Reed to write the book Ten Days that Shook the World. The film also covers attempts to build a communist party in the U.S., the post-World War I “Red Scare” and the early years of the U.S.S.R. Maureen Stapelton won an Oscar for her portrayal of Emma Goldman and Beatty won for Best Director. Interspersed throughout the film are interviews with many of the people who knew Reed and Bryant. Long but highly recommended.
Click here to read Jon Garlock’s introduction to Reds at the Rochester (NY) Labor Film Series.
Trailer
The Russian Revolution Montage
John Reed’s Speech on Freedom and Revolution
THE LABOR FILM DATABASE 