Vitoria, Basque Country, Spain, March 3rd, 1976. After several months of protests demanding decent working conditions, representatives of struggling workers call for a general strike. In the church of San Francisco, in the working class neighborhood of Zaramaga, thousands of workers fill the temple in assembly. Outside, many more people gather and, in the middle, about a hundred heavily armed police officers wait to act.
On March 25, 1911, a catastrophic fire broke out at the Triangle Waist Company in New York City. Trapped inside the upper floors of a ten-story building, 146 workers - mostly young immigrant women and teenage girls - were burned alive or forced to jump to their deaths to escape an inferno that consumed the factory in just 18 minutes. It was the worst disaster at a workplace in New York State until 9/11. The tragedy changed the course of history, paving the way for government to represent working people, not just business, for the first time, and helped an emerging American middle class to live the American Dream.
Documentary marking the 30th anniversary of the 1984 miners' strike, one of the bitterest industrial disputes in British history, with stories from both sides of the conflict.
O Vozerio
For 200 years, coal mining had been a way of life in Cape Breton. By 1920 things were looking up: miners were unionized and paid decent wages. Then the British Empire Steel Corporation arrived and bought every single steel and coal company in Nova Scotia. BESCO cut wages by a third, setting off a bitter labour dispute. The miners settled in for a long strike. Finally, in 1925, the military ended the unrest with brute force. But the miners, in one sense, had won. They broke up the monopoly and provided an example to workers across the country.
On the 5th of March 1985, a crowd gathered in a South Yorkshire pit village to watch a sight none of them had seen in a year. The villagers, many of them in tears, cheered and clapped as the men of Grimethorpe Colliery marched back to work accompanied by the village’s world-famous brass band. The miners and their families had endured months of hardship. It had all been for nothing. The miners had lost the strike called on March 6th 1984. They would lose a lot more in the years to come. But was it a good thing for the country that the miners lost their last battle?
It's been more than 1,000 days since the workers of Cort/Cortek Guitar begun a struggle after the company abruptly closed down. Meanwhile, musicians performed for the workers so many people are aware of the company's injustice, but the company has yet to respond. The workers visit international instrument expositions all around the world, meet other guitar companies such as Fender and Ibanez who subcontract with Cort, and share the struggle with them. The workers also align with musicians in Japan and the USA. They achieve international solidarity through music.
Covers the 12-week-long strike at Kinleith Pulp and Paper Mill, owned by New Zealand Forest Products in January 1980.
There are 200 miserably impoverished people working in the Dongseong Metalworks Factory. JU Wan-ik is introduced to the forging team as a new member of the team and they all go drinking together to welcome him.
La Califfa's husband was killed during the strikes so she takes the side of the strikers. Her conflict with the plant owner Doverdo gradually turns into a love relationship.
Directed by Martin Berger.
A dramatization of the 1968 strike at the Ford Dagenham car plant, where female workers walked out in protest against sexual discrimination.
The story of exploited textile factory workers in Turin, Italy at the turn of the century and their beginnings of their fight for better working conditions. Professor Sinigaglia is sent by (presumably) the Socialists to help them organize their strike and give form to their struggle
Anna and Joe are newly married, playful and deeply in love. Joe is scraping by as cab driver in New York City during a period of corruption, mob control and violence between cab companies.
Dancing in Dulias was made by members of Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners (LGSM) and Lesbians Against Pit Closures during and immediate after the 1984/85 minders strike. Like the forthcoming movie, Pride, it documents the interactions between lesbians and gay men and the miners and their families in Dulais in South Wales - only this time it's the real thing. As well as some memorable footage that includes the Blaenant Lodge banner leading the 1985 Lesbian and Gay Pride march and LGSM members struggling with bingo at the local community hall, the film documents the wider political impact of this seemingly unlikely alliance. (cont. http://www.cambridgefilmfestival.org.uk/films/2014/dancing-in-dulais#sthash.HScQCj7E.dpuf)
In July of 2019 the Blackjewel coal company announced it was declaring bankruptcy. Miners were told to stop working mid shift, and their last paychecks bounced. The miners retaliated by blocking a train full of coal, camping out on the coal tracks for weeks. Queer regional organizers made their way to the encampment to support the miners. The encampment became a place for community gathering and mutual aid distribution. Sarah Moyer, a film maker living in Kentucky, also made their way to the encampment and filmed this short documentary on the blockade. (Summary from Queer Appalachia)
The Delano Manongs tells the story of farm labor organizer Larry Itliong and a group of Filipino farm workers who instigated one of the American farm labor movement’s finest hours – The Delano Grape Strike of 1965 that brought about the creation of the United Farm Workers Union (UFW). While the movement is known for Cesar Chavez’s leadership and considered a Chicano movement, Filipinos played a pivotal role. Filipino labor organizer, Larry Itliong, a cigar-chomping union veteran, organized a group of 1500 Filipinos to strike against the grape growers of Delano, California, beginning a collaboration between Filipinos, Chicanos and other ethnic workers that would go on for years.
A portrait of Chicagoland ICU nurse Jeanette Alvarez-Basem captured through the perspective of her son Ben Basem. Between her night shifts and Illinois Nurses Association union meetings, Jeanette navigates what it means to be a nurse and a human during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In response to a sudden dismissal of staff, workers at a big retail store begin a protest against their employer's oppressive labor policies.
A white and a blue collar worker fall in love during the 1980 strike at FIAT that marked the end for labor movement in Italy.