Based on French journalist Florence Aubenas’s bestselling non-fiction work Le Quai de Ouistreham, investigating rising precarity in French society through her experiences in the northern port city of Caen.
‘Between Two Worlds’ Review: Juliette Binoche Goes Undercover
Singing for Justice tells the story of Faith Petric, a political radical, community organizer and charismatic performer who united folk music and progressive causes from the 1930s through the early 2000s. Narrated largely by Faith herself, the film weaves her musical and political journeys to showcase the central role of folk music in the transformational social movements of the 20th century.
Co-director: Estelle Freedman
ebf@stanford.edu
info@singingforjustice.com
Julia de Guzman
julia@jdgstudio.com
We were never supposed to know her name. She was a poor Irish immigrant who survived famine and war, fire and plague. Unable to save her husband or their four small children, she dedicated her life to saving working families everywhere. The robber barons called her “the most dangerous woman in America,” but workers called her “Mother Jones.”
Upton Sinclair said of her, “she had force, she had wit, she had the fire of indignation; she was the walking wrath of god.” Mother Jones said of herself “I’m not a humanitarian, I’m a hellraiser.” Most famously, she told her followers to, “pray for the Dead and fight like hell for the living.” She educated, agitated, and organized the dispossessed and showed America what it could be.
With the gap between the rich and poor growing wider by the day, the just and democratic society Mother Jones fought for is under attack. Her hour has come again. It is time that her story and the fierce struggles of working families are brought back to life.
Drawn from her autobiography, letters, speeches, and interviews, FIGHT LIKE HELL is as bold and forceful as Mother Jones herself. Adapted from Obie Award-winning Actress Kaiulani Lee’s one-woman play “Can’t Scare Me,” FIGHT LIKE HELL was written and performed by Lee and directed by Emmy-nominated and Peabody Award-winning filmmaker Ian Cheney.
A film by Joanna James
The documentary A Fine Line explores why less than 7% of head chefs and restaurant owners are women, when traditionally women have always held the central role in the kitchen.
Featuring candid interviews with world-renowned chefs including World’s Best Female Chef Dominique Crenn, Emmy Award-winning TV host Lidia Bastianich, two Michelin-starred chef April Bloomfield, Iron Chef Cat Cora, World’s Best Chef Daniel Humm and many more, A Fine Line grapples with themes sparking national conversations right now, including workplace harassment, equal pay, paid parental leave and career advancement.
56 min. | SDH Captions | Scene Selection
Julia Garner is “magnificent” as the personal assistant to a TriBeCa-based film executive whose sexual harassment of hopeful young starlets is an open secret. The name “Weinstein” is never once uttered, and it doesn’t have to be; the writer and director, Kitty Green, uses what we already know to fill in the blanks. We don’t even see the monster in question — he’s just a presence and a voice, in snatches of overheard dialogue and muffled fits of rage, and Green’s beautifully controlled film captures, with brutal, pinpoint accuracy, how that presence infects a workplace, and what happens when someone decides not to play along.
2020 1h 29min | Documentary | 1 February 2021 (USA)
They couldn’t kill their bosses, so they did the next best thing—they organized.
When Dolly Parton sang “9 to 5,” she was doing more than just shining a light on the fate of American working women. Parton was singing the true story of a movement that started with 9to5, a group of Boston secretaries in the early 1970s. Their goals were simple—better pay, more advancement opportunities, and an end to sexual harassment—but their unconventional approach attracted the press and shamed their bosses into change. Featuring interviews with 9to5’s founders, as well as actor and activist Jane Fonda, 9to5: The Story of a Movement is the previously untold story of the fight that inspired a hit and changed the American workplace.
Film website Director: Julia Reichert
julia@donet.com
2019 ‧ Drama ‧ 1h 30m
Made in Bangladesh is a 2019 Bangladeshi drama film directed by Rubaiyat Hossain. It was screened in the Contemporary World Cinema section at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival.
Initial release: September 6, 2019
Director: Rubaiyat Hossain
Language: Bengali language
‘Made in Bangladesh’: Film Review | TIFF 2019
Notes by Steve Cook, President, Washington Baltimore News Guild; cookstevend@gmail.com
Tells the story of a garment worker who decides to organize her coworkers into a union after a fire kills her best friend. The young woman, Shimu, has to overcome skepticism from her coworkers, resistance from her husband, double-crossing from a coworker, pressure from her bosses, bureaucratic inertia from the government, and a host of obstacles like we all face.
I want everyone in my shop and other open shops to see this movie. It really lays out what we all face in organizing, but the stakes are clear as day in a way that it often is difficult to communicate to our units. It would be great if it were available in DVDs, so locals could show it, or people could share it in their homes, or pass it around.
The film also highlights the universal struggles unions face anywhere in the world. The things I described above are things we face in our own organizing efforts. I also took away a message of solidarity with working people regardless of their nationality, geographic location, gender, or ethnicity. Their struggle is our struggle. These are messages that people must hear again and again. Cameron Bailey, the TIFF artistic director called Shimu, “the Norma Rae we need now.”
This movie has distribution in France starting Dec. 5 though an outfit called Pyramide International, which TIFF lists as the international sale agent. As far as I know, no one has picked it up in North America. I think it would be ideal for the DC Labor Filmfest, but also would be great if it could get exposure in North America in the meantime. If you have connections in the distribution industry, perhaps you could spread awareness of the movie among them.
The contact information for Pyramide in the TIFF book are sales@pyramidefilms.com, and 0033142960220.
I also am including some links that give you a fuller idea of what Made in Bangladesh is about. I hope I’ve given enough description of how important I think this movie is. Please feel free to contact me for a fuller description or for any way that I may be able to help.
Steve Cook, President, Washington Baltimore News Guild; cookstevend@gmail.com
https://www.tiff.net/events/made-in-bangladesh
Q&A following the TIFF screening.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPNS4XEoZRU
Pyramide International
http://inter.pyramidefilms.com/pyramidefilms-international-catalogue/made-in-bangladesh.html
In production
Directed by Julia Reichert
Documents the rise of the movement for recognition and fair wages/benefits for women clerical and service workers.
THE LABOR FILM DATABASE 