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Category Archives: Politics

H-2 Worker (1990)

70m; U.S.

Director: Stephanie Black

Synopsis: Stephanie Black has a record of making films about the real costs of economic development including Life and Debt about the economic destruction in Jamaica because of IMF policies. In H-2 worker, we learn about the real labor conditions of agricultural workers who are brought to the US and then used virtually as slave labor in the H-2 program. These workers who are brought in to Florida’s Lake Okeechobee area from Jamaica and the Caribbean are the “slave” workers of America providing great profits for the agricultural owners and misery for the workers and their families. It also is connected with the efforts in California by some leading politicians to bring back the “guest workers” program.

Contact: http://www.lifeanddebt.org/h2worker/

Trailer

 

Roger & Me (1989)

91m; U.S.

Director: Michael Moore

Synopsis: Michael Moore’s documentary about the decline of Flint, Michigan and the role of GM in the deindustrialization of a once-thriving industrial city.

 

 

 

 

 

Trailer

 

Reds (1981)

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