FINALLY GOT THE NEWS is a forceful, unique documentary that reveals the activities of the League of Revolutionary Black Workers inside and outside the auto factories of Detroit. Through interviews with the members of the movement, footage shot in the auto plants, and footage of leafleting and picketing actions, the film documents their efforts to build an independent black labor organization that, unlike the UAW, will respond to worker's problems, such as the assembly line speed-up and inadequate wages faced by both black and white workers in the industry. Beginning with a historical montage, from the early days of slavery through the subsequent growth and organization of the working class, FINALLY GOT THE NEWS focuses on the crucial role played by the black worker in the American economy. Also explored is the educational 'tracking' system for both white and black youth, the role of African American women in the labor force, and relations between white and black workers.
Blair Brown narrates this gripping account of a community's struggle to preserve its way of life. In the summer of 1892, a bitter conflict erupted at the Carnegie Works in Homestead, Pennsylvania. The nation's largest steel maker took on its most militant union with devastating consequences for American workers.
In the winter of 2002-'03, as the US was building its case to attack Iraq, people around the world responded with a series fo the largest peace protests in history. Shutdown: The Rise and Fall of Direct Action to Stop the War, is an action-packed documentary chronicling how DASW successfully organized to shut down a major US city and how they failed to effectively maintain the organization to fight the war machine and end the occupation of Iraq. Created by organizers involved with DASW, Shutdown combines detailed information on organizing for a mass action, critical interviews on organizing pitfalls, and the wisdom of hindsight. It is a must-see film for those engaged in the continuous struggle toward social justice.
Biographical portrait of the labor movement and left wing movement in Uruguay, "Conversations with Turiansky" combines two stories. The first portrays the son of immigrants, the engineer passionate about the mystery of electricity, the man in love, the movie buff. The other places the protagonist in his time: union struggles, the advance of authoritarianism, prison and the challenges of the present. In both are present the lucidity, commitment, discreet tenderness and humor of Wladimir Turiansky.
An in-depth look at the early 2011 crisis for public sector unions in Wisconsin, and why it matters in Alberta.
A Union's Story chronicles the International Brotherhood of Teamsters from its formation in 1903 to its current status as one of the most diverse and powerful unions in the country. The story highlights the Teamsters strong, yet often unrecognized commitment to community service and social justice as well as their ongoing mission to bring dignity and respect to all working families.
When workers at the Hormel meatpacking plant in Austin, Minnesota are asked to take a substantial pay cut in a highly profitable year, the local labor union decides to go on strike and fight for a wage they believe is fair. But as the work stoppage drags on and the strikers face losing everything, friends become enemies, families are divided and the very future of this typical mid American town is threatened.
Gdańsk, Poland, September 1980. Lech Wałęsa and other Lenin shipyard workers found Solidarność (Solidarity), the first independent trade union behind the Iron Curtain. The long and hard battle to bring down communist dictatorship has begun.
‘VIGO 1972’ narrates the events which took place in Vigo in September 1972, when the firing of five Citröen auto workers resulted in the largest general strike in the history of Galicia — with over thirty thousand workers — all of this during the Franco dictatorship in Spain.
Brothers on the Line explores the extraordinary journey of the Reuther brothers – Walter, Roy, and Victor – union organizers whose unshakeable devotion led an army of workers into an epic human rights struggle.
This film documents the coal miners' strike against the Brookside Mine of the Eastover Mining Company in Harlan County, Kentucky in June, 1973. Eastovers refusal to sign a contract (when the miners joined with the United Mine Workers of America) led to the strike, which lasted more than a year and included violent battles between gun-toting company thugs/scabs and the picketing miners and their supportive women-folk. Director Barbara Kopple puts the strike into perspective by giving us some background on the historical plight of the miners and some history of the UMWA. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with New York Women in Film & Television in 2004.
In August 2012, mineworkers in one of South Africa’s biggest platinum mines began a wildcat strike for better wages. Six days later the police used live ammunition to brutally suppress the strike, killing 34 and injuring many more. Using the point of view of the Marikana miners, Miners Shot Down follows the strike from day one, showing the courageous but isolated fight waged by a group of low-paid workers against the combined forces of the mining company Lonmin, the ANC government and their allies in the National Union of Mineworkers.
An experimental documentary exploring the turn-of-century lynching of union organizer Frank Little in Butte, Montana.
The film investigates an industry considered one of the pillars of growth during Kirchnerism in which, during these years, relations and conflicts were drawn between the manufacturers - foreign in its entirety -, the auto parts companies, the Argentine government, the Brazilian one, the union leaderships. -centrally from SMATA-, the workers and the left. The documentary delves into the interests that intersect and the confrontations that originate between the different actors in the chain, which became clear in recent times when the industry, which aspired to reach one million cars manufactured per year, began to regress. The different actors of the "Journey to the Center of Production" are intertwined in the conflict of the auto parts company Gestamp, which opened a dispute regarding who pays for the crisis in the sector and what solutions are seen in that dispute.
How does a country go from a dictatorship to a democracy? A detailed report on the political representation in the heart of the Spanish Transition, only a few months after General Franco’s death, when the sincere democratic vocation of Spanish people must effort to destroy, one heavy brick after another, the wall that those who supported the dictatorship and those who fought it from the exile built with resentment, hatred and prejudices.
In 1981-2, the Kartemquin filmmakers returned to the Taylor Chain plant to show labor and management working together against the odds, trying to save the plant from becoming the latest victim of anti-union legislation and the globalization of cheap, exploitable labor. A sequel to Taylor Chain I: A Story in a Union Local.
Since its adoption in June 1955 by the Congress movement, the Freedom Charter has been the key political document that acted as a beacon and source of inspiration in the liberation struggle against Apartheid. It was reputedly the main source that informed democratic South Africa’s liberal constitution and a constant reference point for the ruling African National Congress (ANC) and rival political parties that it spawned since 1994, all claiming the Freedom Charter’s legacy. Freedom Isn’t Free assesses the history and role of the charter, especially in relation to key political and socio-economic aspects of developments in South Africa up to the present period. It includes rare archival footage with interviews of a cross-section of outspoken influential South Africans.
Documentary about a man remembering his struggles while floating on a boat down a river.
Short documentary on the shunters in the Darling Island, Sydney, Australia railyard. Filmed in 1977.
In their own words, this is the story of six women from the South Wales valleys and how they helped sustain the bitter year-long miners' strike, changing their lives forever.