Working Class | THE LABOR FILM DATABASE

On the Waterfront (1954)

108m; U.S.

Director: Elia Kazan

Cast: Marlon Brando, Karl Malden, Lee J. Cobb

Synopsis (IMDB): Terry Malloy dreams about being a prize fighter, while tending his pigeons and running errands at the docks for Johnny Friendly, the corrupt boss of the dockers union. Terry witnesses a murder by two of Johnny’s thugs, and later meets the dead man’s sister and feels responsible for his death. She introduces him to Father Barry, who tries to force him to provide information for the courts that will smash the dock racketeers.

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in Drama, Whistleblowers, Working Class

Tags: Boating and Shipping

On to Ottawa (1992)

20 Apr

Directed by Sara Diamond
Produced by the On to Ottawa Historical Societyand
The Women’s Labour
History Project
RT: 53 minutes 46 seconds
© 1992 – NTSC / PAL

In 1935 thousands of unemployed men hopped frieght trains for Ottawa demanding work, wages and an end to the relief camps. On to Ottawa brings this historic event to the video medium.

It is based on the play written by Tom Hawken featuring his band, Trek participants Robert “Bobby” Jackson, Ray Wainwright and Jean Evans Sheils, daughter of Trek leader Arthur “Slim” Evans.

Click here for ordering information.

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in Documentary, Labor History, Unemployment-Wages, Working Class

Tags: Wages

One Third of a Nation… (1939)

20 Apr

79m; U.S.

Director: Dudley Murphy

Contact: Sylvia Sidney, Leif Erickson and Myron McCormick

Synopsis (IMDB): A fire in a run-down tenement building injures young Joey Rogers. Wealthy passerby Peter Cortlant rushes the boy and his attractive older sister Mary to the hospital and pays the medical expenses for the poverty-stricken family. Only later does Peter learn that the firetrap tenement is one of his own vast real estate holdings. Faced with his own unwitting complicity in the deaths and injuries resultant from the fire and with his growing attachment to Mary, Peter decides to tear down his tenements and erect decent affordable housing. But his family is aghast at his plan and plots to wreck it.

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in Children, Drama, Safety & Health, Working Class

Our Daily Bread (1934)

20 Apr

80m; U.S.

Director: King Vidor

Cast: Karen Morley, Tom Keene and Barbara Pepper

Synopsis (IMDB): John and Mary sims are city-dwellers hit hard by the financial fist of The Depression. Driven by bravery (and sheer desperation) they flee to the country and, with the help of other workers, set up a farming community – a socialist mini-society based upon the teachings of Edward Gallafent. The newborn community suffers many hardships – drought, vicious raccoons and the long arm of the law – but ultimately pull together to reach a bread-based Utopia.

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in A: Highly Recommended Labor Films, Drama, Farm & Food, Organizing, Philosophy, Politics, Working Class

Outland (1981)

20 Apr

112m; U.S.

Director: Peter Hyams

Cast: Sean Connery, Frances Sternhagen and Peter Boyle

Synopsis (IMDB): Marshal W.T. O’Niel is assigned to a mining colony on Io, one of Jupiter’s moons. During his tenure miners are dying – usually violently. When the marshal investigates he discovers the one thing all the deaths have in common is a lethal amphetamine-type drug, which allows the miners to work continuously for days at a time until they become “burned out” and expire. O’Niel follows the trail of the dealers, which leads to the man overseeing the colony. Now O’Niel must watch his back at every turn, as those who seek to protect their income begin targeting him.

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in Crime-Action, Industrial/Mine/Manufacturing, Safety & Health, SciFi, Working Class

Tags: Mining

Over Land (2008)

20 Apr

59m; Canada
Director: Steve Suderman

Synopsis: Family farmers face the threat of closing.

Over Land is an intimate and personal portrait of a family facing a crisis in agriculture. Between 1996 and 2006, despite warnings of an impending food shortage, prices for farm goods dropped to their lowest point in Canadian history, driving many farmers off the land. With a family history of farming spanning generations, the Sudermans now face a challenge that threatens to pull the family apart.

Over Land features original music composed and performed by Dirk Powell.The executive producer is Robin Schlaht. Directed by Steve Suderman.

Contact: steve@gorgeousproductions.ca 306-525-2524 (Home)

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in Documentary, Farm & Food, Global Economy, Unemployment-Wages, Working Class

Tags: Food Service Industry

Painting Red Square (2009)

20 Apr

5m; Canada
Director: Max Fraser
Available online

7000 km from Moscow, there’s another Red Square….Witness the struggle of the labour-left in Whitehorse to find a friendly watering hole where they can share a glass with their comrades and debate which shade of red is best. Paint, popcorn and a little beer get spilled along the way.

DVD with extra chapters: 20 mins

Featuring: Del Young and the gang at Red Square.

GENRE: Humour
Tags: Beer, Whitehorse, High Country Inn, TGIF, Paint, Red Square, Labour, Left, Canadian North

Max Fraser website

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in Arts/Culture, Comedy, Documentary, Service Workers, Streaming Online (Youtube, Vimeo), Working Class

Tags: Food Service Industry

The Pajama Game (1957)

20 Apr

101m; U.S.

Director: George Abbott, Stanley Donen

Cast: Doris Day, John Raitt and Carol Haney

Synopsis (IMDB): Employees of the Sleeptite Pajama Factory are looking for a whopping seven-and-a-half cent an hour increase and they won’t take no for an answer. Babe Williams is their feisty employee representative but she may have found her match in shop superintendent Sid Sorokin. When the two get together they wind up discussing a whole lot more than job actions

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in Collective Bargaining, Comedy, Manufacturing, Musical, Romance, Women, Working Class

Tags: Wages

Palace Cars and Paradise: The Pullman Model Town (1983)

20 Apr

28m; U.S.

Synopsis: Concerned with the model town that George Pullman conceived and named after himself in the 1880s to house the largely white task force of skilled and unskilled mechanics who labored in the company’s massive car construction and repair shop.

Contact: Available from the Illinois Labor History Society 28 E. Jackson Boulevard, Chicago Ill, 60604.

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Posted by Metro Council on April 20, 2012 in Documentary, Transportation, Working Class