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Category Archives: Themes

Native Land (1942)

22 Feb

Directed by: Leo Hurwitz & Paul Strand
Running Time: 1hr 20 min
Starring: N/A
Website

Synopsis:In dramatizations, we see a farmer beaten for speaking up at a meeting, a union man murdered in a boarding house, two sharecroppers near Fort Smith Arkansas shot by men deputized by the local sheriff, a spy stealing the names of union members, and a dead Chicago union man eulogized.

A combination of a documentary format and staged reenactments, the film depicted the struggle of trade unions against union-busting corporations, their spies and contractors. It was based on the 1938 report of the La Follette Committee‘s investigation of the repression of labor organizing.

Famous African-American singer, actor and activist Paul Robeson participated as an off-screen narrator and vocalist.

 
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Posted by on February 22, 2017 in Documentary, Drama, Labor History, Organizing, Strikes-Strikebreaking-Lockouts

 

Metropolis (1927)

22 Feb

Directed by: Fritz Lang
Running Time: 148 min
Starring: N/A

Website: http://www.kinolorber.com/sites/metropolis/

Synopsis: In a futuristic city sharply divided between the working class and the city planners, the son of the city’s mastermind falls in love with a working class prophet who predicts the coming of a savior to mediate their differences.

 
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Posted by on February 22, 2017 in SciFi, Streaming Online (Youtube, Vimeo), Technology

 

Senorita Extraviada (2001)

17 Feb

Directed by: Lourdes Portillo
Running Time: 74 min
Starring: N/A

Website: http://www.wmm.com/filmcatalog/pages/c579.shtml

Synopsis: SENORITA EXTRAVIADA, MISSING YOUNG WOMAN tells the haunting story of the more than 350 kidnapped, raped and murdered young women of Juárez, Mexico. Visually poetic, yet unflinching in its gaze, this compelling investigation unravels the layers of complicity that have allowed for the brutal murders of women living along the Mexico-U.S. border. In the midst of Juárez’s international mystique and high profile job market, there exists a murky history of grossly underreported human rights abuses and violence against women. The climate of violence and impunity continues to grow, and the murders of women continue to this day. Relying on what Portillo comes to see as the most reliable of sources – the testimonies of the families of the victims –SEÑORITA EXTRAVIADA, MISSING YOUNG WOMAN documents a two-year search for the truth in the underbelly of the new global economy. An Independent Television Service (ITVS) Production.

 
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Posted by on February 17, 2017 in Documentary, Immigrants/Immigration

 

Prescription for Change (1986)

17 Feb

Directed by: Lyn Goldfarb and Tami Gold
Running Time: 30 min
Starring: N/A

Website: http://andersongoldfilms.com/films/documentaries/pfc.htm

Synopsis: traditionally female, underpaid and under-appreciated. This documentary presents a rare behind-the-scenes look at nursing. Produced over ten years ago – before prime-time’s ER and CHICAGO HOPE – this documentary has a clear feminist perspective and continues to be refreshing and relevant.

 

 
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Posted by on February 17, 2017 in Documentary, Safety & Health, Short

 

Gasland (2010)

16 Feb

Directed by: Josh Fox
Running Time: 104 min
Starring: N/A

Website: http://one.gaslandthemovie.com/home

Synopsis: “The largest domestic natural gas drilling boom in history has swept across the United States. The Halliburton-developed drilling technology of “fracking” or hydraulic fracturing has unlocked a “Saudia Arabia of natural gas” just beneath us. But is fracking safe? When filmmaker Josh Fox is asked to lease his land for drilling, he embarks on a cross-country odyssey uncovering a trail of secrets, lies and contamination. A recently drilled nearby Pennsylvania town reports that residents are able to light their drinking water on fire. This is just one of the many absurd and astonishing revelations of a new country called GASLAND. Part verite travelogue, part expose, part mystery, part bluegrass banjo meltdown, part showdown.”

 
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Posted by on February 16, 2017 in Documentary, Environment

 

From Bedside to Bargaining Table (1984)

16 Feb

Directed by: Lyn Goldfarb and Tami Gold
Running Time: 20 min
Starring: N/A

Synopsis: This inspiring documentary looks at nursing from the nurse’s point of view, encouraging healthcare professionals to work together to change their poor working conditions and gain self-respect.

 
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Posted by on February 16, 2017 in Documentary, Safety & Health, Short

 

Ditching the Fear (2015)

16 Feb

Trailer: http://en.labournet.tv/video/6941/ditching-fear-trailer

Directed by: Rosa Cannone/Johanna Schellhagen

Running Time: 80 minutes.
Starring: N/A

Since 2008 in northern Italy, unusual things have been happening. Companies, the political class and the media are using the onset of the crisis to further undermine workers’ rights, which have been, up until now, crushed. On the other side, a lively and strong resistance has been forming at the bottom end of the wage scale.

Of all people, it is the precarious and largely migrant workers in the logistics sector who have, through solidarity and effective organizing, been successful in overcoming their isolation and degrading working conditions. A struggle that hasn’t just changed their working conditions but has changed their whole lives.

“I’d been talking with the girls since 2012 because I came to know about this union called SI Cobas. But there has been a lot of fear because they put you in a condition of servility, you are enslaved to the point that you can’t even say ‘a’. You don’t say anything, you work item after item after item… So I’d been speaking with the girls since 2012 and I don’t know how it happened. It was good luck.” (Yoox Worker, from the film)

 

 

 
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Posted by on February 16, 2017 in Documentary, Manufacturing, Streaming Online (Youtube, Vimeo)

 

She’s Beautiful When She’s Angry (2014)

18 Dec
Filmmaker Mary Dore chronicles the events, the movers and the shakers of the feminist movement from 1966 to 1971.
Release date: November 13, 2014 (Salt Lake City)
Director: Mary Dore
Music composed by: Mark Degli Antoni
Producers: Mary Dore, Nancy Kennedy
Cinematography: Svetlana Cvetko, Alicia Weber

SHE’S BEAUTIFUL WHEN SHE’S ANGRY resurrects the buried history of the outrageous, often brilliant women who founded the modern women’s movement from 1966 to 1971.   SHE’S BEAUTIFUL takes us from the founding of NOW, with ladies in hats and gloves, to the emergence of more radical factions of women’s liberation; from intellectuals like Kate Millett to the street theatrics of W.I.T.C.H. (Women’s International Conspiracy from Hell!).  Artfully combining dramatizations, performance and archival imagery, the film recounts the stories of women who fought for their own equality, and in the process created a world-wide revolution.

SHE’S BEAUTIFUL does not try to romanticize the early movement, but dramatizes it in its exhilarating, quarrelsome, sometimes heart-wrenching glory.   The film does not shy away from the controversies over race, sexual preference and leadership that arose in the women’s movement.  SHE’S BEAUTIFUL WHEN SHE’S ANGRY captures the spirit of the time — thrilling, scandalous, and often hilarious.

That story still resonates today for women who are facing new challenges around reproductive rights and sexual violence, as the film shows present-day activists creating their generation’s own version of feminism. SHE’S BEAUTIFUL WHEN SHE’S ANGRY is a film about activists, made to inspire women and men to work for feminism and human rights.

 
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Posted by on December 18, 2016 in Women

 

Robot Somnambulism (2016)

18 Dec

Richard HSIAO
2016 / Taiwan / Documentary / 90min /
Foxconn, the world’s largest electronics OEM factory, manufactured and assembled more than 50% iPhone of the world. In 2010, the serial jumping of Foxconn workers caught attention. People holding iPhone suddenly noticed that it’s producer were working like a robot, acting every 7 seconds, 12 hour a day. They felt a bit uneasy, but cannot loosen their hand. Smartphone has changed human life completely. On the other side, the company supplying touch panels to HTC were suppressing worker union. Union and supporting students choose HTC to protest, making its managers feel embarrassed and aggrieved. Meanwhile, one of HTC engineer died possibly because of overworking. His last message on Facebook was “off work, issue still not resolved”, AM 3 o’clock, Sunday. In this era, robotic people making humanized machine, is it a hopeless tragedy, or the beginning of a brave new world?

 
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Posted by on December 18, 2016 in Automation, Consumerism, Documentary, Global Economy, Industrial/Mine/Manufacturing, Manufacturing, Safety & Health, Technology

 

Deepwater Horizon (2016)

18 Dec

Director: Peter Berg

Writers: Matthew Michael Carnahan (screenplay), Matthew Sand (screenplay) |3 more credits »

Stars: Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell, Douglas M. Griffin

A Hollywood thriller recreates the 2010 disaster in which a BP oil rig caught on fire and exploded, killing 11 people and releasing tens of millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. High-level acting and special effects help tell the story of BP’s greed that led to the worst oil spill in U.S. history.
 
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Posted by on December 18, 2016 in Construction Trades, Drama, Environment, Safety & Health

 
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