Labor goes to the Movies

Actor Harold Phillips sorts through this year’s Screen Actors Guild Award nominees for laborific films and television shows, from Everything Everywhere All At Once to The Fabelmans, Severance, The Bear and Abbott Elementary.

Produced by Chris Garlock. 

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @haroldPDX @sagaftra #SAGAwards @netflix

"It's definitely a woman's story and I think that's appropriate, obviously, because the story of the Me Too movement is also a woman's story, but also because journalism is increasingly a woman's story."
Award-winning journalist Eric Alterman, The Nation’s “Liberal Media” columnist for 25 years, on “She Said,” the “embattled craft of journalism” and his favorite films about journalism. Click here for his December 2022 At the Movies column in The American Prospect.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @TheProspect

“It’s intriguing that two biopics of the 20th century’s most famous —and most working-class—superstars have appeared in 2022,” says our guest on today’s show, Carnegie Mellon professor Kathy Newman, who wrote about the films “Blonde” and “Elvis” on the Working-Class Perspectives blog in a piece entitled Marilyn and Elvis: Dead Labor in the Age of Streaming. But Elise wants to know Where are all the Black biopics, What have they done to Norma Jean, and anyway, “Black people wouldn't be crazy screaming for Elvis the way they’re portrayed in the film.” Listen to this podcast; it could save you six hours of your life!

Edited/produced by Chris Garlock.

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1@_kathymnewman

Peter Dreier on "5 unsung films that dramatize America’s rich labor history": Northern Lights (1978), North Country (2005), The Devil and Miss Jones (1941), 10,000 Black Men Named George (2002) and Salt of The Earth (1954).
Dreier is E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics, and Professor, Urban & Environmental Policy at Occidental College in Los Angeles.

Edited/produced by Chris Garlock.

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @PeterDreier

"I don't love economic exploitation, but I do love Christmas and Christmas movies. They work to sell me stuff and ideology, but they also critique commercialism and exploitation. See what subversive messages you can find in a holiday classic. I triple dog dare you!"
That’s Kathy M. Newman, a frequent guest here on Labor Goes to The Movies; Kathy’s an associate professor of literary and cultural studies at Carnegie Mellon University, where she writes about radio, television, and contemporary media. Our discussion today is based on her terrific article A Working-Class Christmas Story Christmas posted this week on the Working-Class Perspectives blog.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @_kathymnewman

Julia Reichert’s death from cancer on December 1 at the age of 76 made headlines across the country. Most of them called her an “Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker” and that was certainly true: she was a four-time Academy Award-nominated director, for 1977’s Union Maids, Seeing Red: Stories of American Communists in 1984, The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant in 2010 and American Factory, for which she won an Oscar in 2020.

But we thought Julia would have really got a kick out of The New York Times, which called her “Documentarian of the Working Class.” Back in 2020, Julia talked with 9 to 5 co-founder Karen Nussbaum about how her working-class upbringing informed her work as much as her left politics; she offered advice for chronicling the pandemic, and told what it was like to give her acceptance speech at the Academy Awards that year.

The interview, originally published in The American Prospect in April 2020, ran in two parts on the Labor History Today podcast; you can hear the first part here today on Labor Goes to the Movies, and the second part will run in this Sunday’s Labor History Today podcast.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @karenbnussbaum @TheProspect

The 1960 documentary Harvest of Shame -- presented by legendary broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow on CBS  -- was revolutionary in its raw portrayal of poverty amongst migrant farm workers. Originally aired just after Thanksgiving Day in November 1960, it was "the first time millions of Americans were given a close look at what it means to live in poverty" on their televisions.

On today’s show, from the WBAI show Building Bridges -- produced by Ken Nash and Mimi Rosenberg -- Jessica Garcia, RWDSU farm labor organizer and David Dyssegaard Kallick, Director of the Immigration Research Initiative at The Economic Policy Institute, discuss the film's legacy and the state of farm workers today. They train a spotlight on the low pay and poor conditions endured by the people who help bring America's food to the table, and union organizing, always a challenge in the agricultural sector, while making some recent triumphs even sweeter.

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @RWDSU @EconomicPolicy @WBAI

Ellen Cassedy, one of the founders 9 to 5, the national association of women office workers, talks about her new book, “Working 9 to 5: A women’s movement, a labor union, and the iconic movie,” and she shares some insider stories about the 1980 hit film 9 to 5 (hint: Dabney Coleman wasn’t just acting his iconic role as a bad boss!).

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @ellencassedy #working9to5

Elise and Chris talk with Kathleen M. Newman and Tom Zaniello about one of those lists of “10 best labor films”; which films make the cut, which don’t, and why. Movies discussed include 9 to 5, Support The Girls, Modern Times, Newsies, and The Pajama Game.  

A regular with us here on Labor Goes to the Movies, Kathy’s a professor of English, literary and cultural studies at Carnegie Mellon University, where she teaches and writes about labor, class, film, and media. Tom Zaniello has written a number of books on labor films, including Working Stiffs, Union Maids, Reds, and Riffraff: An Expanded Guide to Films about Labor.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1

We’re back! Elise and Chris got a bit busy with other projects this past summer but we did get a chance to chat with Kathleen M. Newman back at the end of July. A regular with us here on Labor Goes to the Movies, Kathy’s a professor of English, literary and cultural studies at Carnegie Mellon University, where she teaches and writes about labor, class, film, and media. We’d run across one of those lists of “10 best labor films” that pops up from time to time and decided it was a good chance to talk about which films make the lists, which don’t, and why.
Today’s episode is the first part of that conversation; next week we’ll have the second part, when Tom Zaniello, who’s written a number of books on labor films (including Working Stiffs, Union Maids, Reds, and Riffraff: An Expanded Guide to Films about Labor) joins us to provide his perspective.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1

This week’s guest is Juliana Barnet, an “anticolonial anthropologist” who’s been active in a wide range of movements in the United States and in Mexico. Earlier this year she started a blog called Activist Explorer, where she writes about how activists and social change movements are depicted in fiction, including films.

Reminder: LGTTM co-host Elise Bryant will conduct a Q&A with 9to5 co-founder Karen Nussbaum at the May 23 DC Labor FilmFest screening of 9 to 5: The Story of a Movement at the AFI Silver.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @AFISilver

Labor Goes to the Movies co-host Elise Bryant recalls the impact of seeing the 1980 hit film 9 to 5 as a working secretary; she went on to a career as a labor educator who worked with 9 to 5 co-founder Karen Nussbaum and now leads the Coalition of Labor Union Women. Elise will conduct a Q&A with Karen Nussbaum at the May 23 DC Labor FilmFest screening of 9 to 5: The Story of a Movement at the AFI Silver. There are also two upcoming screenings -- on May 15 & 17 -- of 9 to 5, the 1980 hit starring Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin and Dolly Parton.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @AFISilver @Janefonda @LilyTomlin @DollyParton @9to5org

Soleil Ho and Amanda Yee teamed up to write BLACK DINNERS MATTER for Whetstone Magazine, in which they examine the films Moonlight, Do the Right Thing and The Color Purple, arguing that “the dinner table is erected as a potent metaphor for ownership and communion… With four centuries of slavery as the backdrop, what’s eaten and where depicts how enslaved Africans and their descendants reclaimed their agency, had it stripped away, and in some cases, even participated in supremacist structures like patriarchy.”
Soleil Ho is the restaurant critic for the San Francisco Chronicle; Amanda Yee trained as a chef, went to university for English and Sociology, writes with a special interest in the intersection of food and justice and is Creative Director for 4 Color Imprint of Tenspeed/ Penguin Random House.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @hooleil

Upcoming DCLFF screenings:

LOCAL 1196: A STEELWORKERS STRIKE
Mon, April 11, 6:00pm – 7:30pm; FREE: RSVP HERE
Followed by a conversation with Pennsylvania Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman.

THE WOBBLIES
Sunday, May 1, 5:30p; AFI Silver Theatre, 8633 Colesville Road, Silver Spring, MD 20910; INFO/TICKETS
Opening Night of the 2022 DC Labor FilmFest!

Last year, 1,500 steelworkers in Western Pennsylvania went out on strike for four long months. If you don’t remember hearing about the strike, don’t worry, we hadn’t, either. It was against a company named ATI, Allegheny Technologies Incorporated, and even though the strike involved 1,500 steelworkers at nine different locations, it never really made the radar on the national labor scene in a year that saw a huge increase in both strikes and union organizing.

So we’re very fortunate that Samuel George decided to embed himself and his camera in the strike by Local 1196. Sam is an exciting young documentary filmmaker who works for the Bertelsmann Foundation, a non-profit, non-partisan organization based in Washington, DC. Samuel’s documentaries – which include "The Fields of Immokalee” -- bring viewers up close and personal to people and communities facing the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century, offering candid perspectives that allow viewers to draw their own conclusions. His films focus on the intersection of politics, economics, social issues, and daily life. Filming on the ground from the Turkish – Syrian border, to the factories of Juarez, Mexico, to elections in West Virginia, and now a factory in Western Pennsylvania, Sam’s films seek to offer a voice to those affected by policy and macro trends, but who often are denied a seat at the table where decisions are made.  

Local 1196: A Steelworkers Strike screens free this Saturday, March 19, at 4pm, at the MLK DC Public Library, 901 G St. NW in Washington, DC; CLICK HERE to RSVP.

Produced by Chris Garlock, edited and co-produced by Evan Papp, Empathy Media Lab.

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @SamuelGeorge76 @BertelsmannFdn @empathymedialab @steelworkers Local 1196

LGTTM co-host Chris Garlock got to know Harold Phillips a couple of years ago when he started working with Chris to build the Labor Radio Podcast Network. Harold, who now co-hosts the Working to Live In Southwest Washington podcast, has been a working actor for more than thirty years, with dozens of movie and TV credits. On today’s show, we find out how Harold got into acting, the huge amount of work behind the Screen Actors Guild Awards– which air this Sunday, February 27 at 8pm ET on TNT and TBS – and Harold’s picks for the most laborific films nominated for SAG awards this year, including Belfast, King Richard, West Side Story, Squid Game, Maid, White Lotus, Dopesick, The Chair, and The Morning Show.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @haroldPDX @sagaftra

PLUS: Check out Organizing the White Lotus on Laborwave Radio.

Upcoming DCLFF screening: THE FIRST WAVE & CORONAVIRUS CAPITALISM; Tuesday, March 8; FREE; 7p ET; RSVP HERE.
Two must-see films about the pandemic. The First Wave (2021, 93m) follows nurses, doctors, and administrators as they all desperately try to navigate the COVID-19 crisis. Coronavirus Capitalism (2020, 8:48) features Naomi Klein on how COVID gives capitalists license to steal even more than they used to.
Introduced by Ken Zinn, Political Director for National Nurses United.

"A breathtaking testament to the fight to live, the calling to heal, and the power of human connection." Variety

Co-sponsored by: Busboys and Poets, Old Labor Hall (Barre. VT), London Labour Film Festival, Construir Cine Film Festival(Buenos Aires, Argentina).

Harold Meyerson, Editor At Large for The American Prospect, writes some of the best political analysis around, but every so often he’ll drop a fascinating column about a film; it was a recent piece he did on Mank that prompted us to invite him on the show, but it turned out that what he really wanted to talk about was When Tomorrow Comes, a 1939 film that we had never heard of, but that Harold insists is one of the “most pro-labor films” ever released. He also has some interesting insights into The Irishman, Martin Scorcese’s 2019 film about Jimmy Hoffa.

Movie: When Tomorrow Comes(1939)
When Irene Dunne Sang "Solidarity Forever" by Harold Meyerson.
Trailer: The Irishman (2019)
What Did Hoffa Want? by Harold Meyerson.

Produced by Chris Garlock
@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @HaroldMeyerson

Upcoming DCLFF screening: THE FIRST WAVE & CORONAVIRUS CAPITALISM
Tuesday, March 8; FREE; 7p ET; RSVP HERE.
Two must-see films about the pandemic. The First Wave (2021, 93m) follows nurses, doctors, and administrators as they all desperately try to navigate the COVID-19 crisis. Coronavirus Capitalism (2020, 8:48) features Naomi Klein on how COVID gives capitalists license to steal even more than they used to.
Introduced by Ken Zinn, Political Director for National Nurses United.
"A breathtaking testament to the fight to live, the calling to heal, and the power of human connection." Variety
Co-sponsored by: Busboys and Poets, Old Labor Hall (Barre. VT), London Labour Film Festival, Construir Cine Film Festival(Buenos Aires, Argentina).

When iconic and groundbreaking actor Sidney Poitier died last month, most of the tributes focused on his brilliant acting, for which he received innumerable awards, as well as his advocacy for Civil Rights. But as Kathy Newman pointed out in a column for Working-Class Perspectives, before he became an actor, Poitier worked as a dishwasher, construction worker, and longshoreman. Famously choosy about his roles on-screen, he played a number of working-class characters throughout his career, and was proud of his working-class and immigrant roots.
Kathy, a frequent guest on this podcast, is a professor of English, literary and cultural studies at Carnegie Mellon university, where she teaches and writes about labor, class, film and media.

Sidney Poitier: Nobody You Can Boss Around, by Kathy M. Newman.
Lilies of the Field; Blackboard Jungle; Edge of the City; A Raisin in the Sun; The Defiant Ones.

NOTE: Check out the DC Labor FilmFest’s upcoming Film/Book/Talk, “Confessions of A Union Buster,” Tuesday, February 8, 7pm – 9pm: FREE; RSVP HERE. Short film program and Q&A with legendary union organizer Bob Muehlenkamp, author of the forward for Confessions of a Union Buster: New Activist Edition (2022).

Produced by Chris Garlock
@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @_kathymnewman

In March 1970 the Teaching Assistants Association at the University of Wisconsin went out on strike for twenty-four days. It was the first TA strike in the history of the United States; the union went on to represent Wisconsin TAs for over fifty years. The film that those students made back then has just been re-edited and re-released, so we sat down with legendary organizer Bob Muehlenkamp – who helped organize the TA union -- to talk about the strike, the film and the labor movement today. Bob wound up leading the Teaching Assistants Association and going on to a long career as a union organizer, he was the National Organizing Director at SEIU-1199, the hospital workers union, and then the Teamster’s Organizing Director.

NOTE: With Babies and Banners (with filmmaker Lyn Goldfarb and CLUW president – and Labor Goes to the Movies podcast co-host – Elise Bryant) screens online FREE on Thursday, January 27 starting at 7p ET; RSVP here.

Produced by Chris Garlock
@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest

Five labor-related films were inducted into the National Film Registry last year: The Murder of Fred Hampton (1971), Requiem-29 (1971), The Wobblies (1979), Chicana (1979) and Who Killed Vincent Chin? (1987). Films in the Registry are selected for their cultural, historic or aesthetic importance to preserve the nation’s film heritage, and the Library of Congress, which maintains the Registry, says that the 2021 selections “represent one of the most diverse classes of films” yet, a fair description for a list that includes both 'Return of the Jedi' and ‘The Murder of Fred Hampton’.

We asked Pat Aufderheide and Tom Zaniello to join us for a discussion about the labor selections. Pat is Professor of Communication Studies in the School of Communication at American University in Washington, D.C., where she founded the School's Center for Media & Social Impact. Tom is the author of a bunch of books on film and work, including Working Stiffs, Union Maids, Reds, and Riffraff, The Cinema of Globalization and The Cinema of the Precariat.

NOTE: With Babies and Banners (with filmmaker Lyn Goldfarb and CLUW president – and LaborGoes to the Movies podcast co-host – Elise Bryant) screens online FREE on Thursday, January 27, 2022 starting at 7p ET; RSVP here.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest

Today’s film is a short documentary that should have been made in the nineteen-thirties, about women who played crucial roles in the sit-down strikes at General Motors factories in 1936 and 1937, strikes that changed American history.
Instead, With Babies and Banners was made in the nineteen-seventies, by a group of women who were not filmmakers but who realized that film was the most powerful way to not only recover this erased history but to be an agent of change, just like those strikes forty years earlier.
On today’s show, Elise and Chris talk with Lyn Goldfarb, one of the producers of With Babies and Banners, about how – against incredible odds, the film came to be, and why it still resonates for audiences today.
They’re joined by labor educator John Revitte, who used various films in classes, including With Babies and Banners.
NOTE: With Babies and Banners (with filmmaker Lyn Goldfarb and CLUW president – and LaborGoes to the Movies podcast co-host – Elise Bryant) screens online FREE on Thursday, January 27, 2022 starting at 7p ET; RSVP here.

Music: I Am a Union Woman-Bobbie McGee

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @LynGoldfarb @RevitteL

The recent Netflix series Maid, based on Stephanie Land's memoir, highlights the challenges that poor and working-class mothers face in juggling low-wage jobs, social services, and child care.
On today’s show, Chris and Elise talk with Lane Windham and Kathy Newman about Maid and the issues it raises about women and work.
Kathy's a professor of English, literary and cultural studies at Carnegie Mellon university, where she teaches and writes about labor, class, film and media.
Lane is an experienced organizer, educator, historian, and activist; she directs WILL Empower, an ambitious collaborative project with Rutgers University to promote women's leadership in the labor movement and the struggle for economic justice. She wrote about Maid in Blue-Collar Babies: Why America’s Working Class Needs Affordable Child Care.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @WomenLeadLabor @_kathymnewman

Now in its 34th year, the AFI European Union Film Showcase continues its tradition of bringing the best in European cinema to Washington, DC-area audiences. This year's selection includes 53 films from all 27 EU Member States, 11 of them are top contenders for this year's Academy Award® for Best International Feature Film and 13 U.S. and North American premieres.
Three of the films are co-presented by the DC Labor FilmFest: THE GOOD BOSS (starring Javier Bardem), BETWEEN TWO WORLDS (starring Juliette Binoche), and LUZZU.
On today’s show, Elise and Chris discuss the Showcase and the featured labor films -- two of which premiere the weekend of December 4-5 -- with AFI Silver Programming Director Todd Hitchcock and Temporary Associate Film Programmer Josh Gardner; all the films have second showings as well.

Films about work shape our attitudes toward labor and laboring, often by inviting us to identify with individual characters. But what happens when film presents a more direct experience of what workers actually do?  
In a column for the Working-Class Perspectives blog, James Catano considered three non-fiction films about the fishing industry:  Drifters (1929), Pescherecci (1958), and Leviathan (2013).  
On today’s show, Chris and Elise talk with Jim about how these films offer a brief overview of methods for portraying work, and they also help us think about a common format of reality television: the fishing program.

James Catano is producer/director of Enduring Legacy:  Louisiana’s Croatian Americans and author of Ragged Dicks:  Masculinity, Steel, and the Rhetoric of the Self-Made Man.
He’s Professor Emeritus of English and Screen Arts at Louisiana State University.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest

Elise and Chris discuss Who Killed Vincent Chen? (1987) and Complicit (2016) with Virginia Rodino and Heather White, who will be participating in a panel discussion on “Understanding AAPI Hate: Building A Movement of Solidarity and Resistance” on Sunday, July 18 at 7pm.
Both films are available now (through July 18) for free online screening.

Virginia Rodino is president of the Maryland chapter of APALA, the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, a constituency group of the AFL-CIO.

Heather White is a documentary filmmaker and research consultant with more than 20 years experience in international advocacy on labor and human rights issues (she founded Verite). she co-directed Complicit with Lynn Zhang. The film, released in 2016, was screened at 40 film festivals and won nine international festival awards.

NOTES:
Who Killed Vincent Chen? was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature; director Christine Choi will also be on the July 18 panel.  

Here's the link to the brief video interview with Heather’s assistant, “who had to flee Shenzhen while we were making Complicit. Her experience underscores the risks to activists and NGO's trying to help workers in China. They get harassed to the point where they have to discontinue even when they don't want to.”

The new pandemic film Heather refers to is Songbird (2020).

Produced by Chris Garlock
@dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @APALAnational

With just one week to go before the 2021 DC Labor FilmFest wraps up, Labor Goes to the Movies co-host Chris Garlock sat down with Tom Zaniello – author of “Working Stiffs, Union Maids, Reds and Riffraff, An Expanded Guide to Films About Labor” – for his “Best of the Fest” picks.

All the 2021 films are still available in the AFI Silver’s DC Labor FilmFest Virtual Screening Room, through Sunday, June 6, including: WORK SONGS * THE LUNCHROOM [PLANTA PERMANENTE] * IDA B. WELLS: A PASSION FOR JUSTICE * MISS MARX * THE CHAMBERMAID [LA CAMARISTA] * THE WHISTLE AT EATON FALLS * NASRIN * THE NEW DEAL FOR ARTISTS.
NOTE: click here for HAYMARKET - THE BOMB, THE ANARCHISTS, THE LABOR STRUGGLE.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest

Lincoln Cushing and Harvey Smith discuss The New Deal For Artists, now showing in the DC Labor FilmFest. Narrated by Orson Welles, this remastered classic features interviews and commentary by John Houseman, Studs Terkel, Howard Da Silva, Arthur Rothstein, Joseph Losey, Norman Lloyd and more.
Archivist and historian Lincoln Cushing is the author of All Of Us Or None: Social Justice Posters of the San Francisco Bay Area and Agitate! Educate! Organize! - American Labor Posters; Harvey Smith is the author of Berkeley and the New Deal. Find out more on The Living New Deal website.
We have a bonus guest this week, as longtime union organizer Carl Goldman drops by to tell us about the brand-new film We Made Matzah Balls For The Revolution.
All the DC Labor FilmFest films are still available in the AFI Silver’s DC Labor FilmFest Virtual Screening Room.  
PLUS: Register now for the 2021 Great Labor Arts Exchange, coming up – online – June 17-20.

Produced by Chris Garlock and Evan Papp.

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @LincCushing

Kathy M. Newman on “Paradise Lost: The Spectacular Failure of The Whistle at Eaton Falls.”Newman is an English professor at Carnegie Mellon who writes regularly on class and culture and who’s currently at work on a book entitled “Backstory: Film, Television, and Social Class in the 1950s,” which includes an entire chapter on the rarely-seen – and recently restored – 1951 film The Whistle at Eaton Falls, which – along with all the 2021 films -- is still available in the AFI Silver’s DC Labor FilmFest Virtual Screening Room.  
PLUS: Viewer reaction to Miss Marx, the film about Karl Marx’s youngest daughter.  

If you’d like to be part of our final weekly conversation about labor films, join us this Thursday, May 27 at 7p ET; RSVP here.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @_kathymnewman

Viewer reaction to Ida B. Wells: A Passion for Justice, plus Elise and Chris get into the critical weeds on Miss Marx, the film about Karl Marx’s youngest daughter. Elise loved it but Chris isn’t so sure. But hey, you be the judge; you can watch Miss Marx and all of the films released so far in this year’s DC Labor FilmFest in the AFI Silver’s DC Labor FilmFest Virtual Screening Room.
PLUS: sneak previews of the films opening this week, THE WHISTLE AT EATON  FALLS (5/18) and NASRIN (5/20); check out the complete line-up for the 2021 DC Labor FilmFest.  

If you’d like to be part of our weekly conversation about labor films, join us Thursdays at 7p ET; RSVP here.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest

We cover a lot of ground on our first Labor Goes to the Movies Movie Club session, from an in-depth discussion of Ida B. Wells to the worker origins of zombies. Plus we get a fascinating glimpse into Elise’s Detroit theater roots and…is The Death of Stalin a labor movie?  

Plus the trailer for Miss Marx, which opens on Tuesday May 11; check out the complete line-up for the 2021 DC Labor FilmFest.  

If you’d like to be part of our weekly conversation about labor films, join us Thursdays at 7p ET; RSVP here.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest

Introducing Silver Streams, the terrific podcast from the programming team at the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center, the longtime home of the DC Labor FilmFest. We love working with Todd, Abby and Ben and we also love their podcast and wanted to share it with you to give you a sense of just how deep their knowledge and enthusiasm for the movies is. In this episode, Todd, Abby and Ben go deep – and I mean deep -- on NINE TO FIVE for its 40th anniversary and I think you’ll really enjoy their insights into the film and everything that makes this box office hit an enduring labor classic.

Subscribe to Silver Streams here, where you can also check out all their fascinating episodes. Be sure to check out the line-up for the 2021 DC Labor FilmFest and if you’d like to be part of the conversation about labor films, don’t miss the weekly Labor Goes to the Movies podcast Movie Club discussions Thursdays at 7p ET; RSVP here.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 @DCLaborFilmFest @Janefonda @LilyTomlin @DollyParton

Labor historians Joe McCartin (Georgetown University) and Steve Brier(CUNY School of Labor) join Haymarket: The Bomb, the Anarchists, the Labor Struggle director Adrian Prawica on a special May Day discussion, moderated by LGTTM’s Chris Garlock. Their wide-ranging discussion not only connects the events of 1886 in Chicago to the broader world at the time, but to our own lives and struggles today, 135 years later.

The discussion was conducted online with audience participation as part of the 2021 DC Labor FilmFest and co-sponsored by the Global Labor Film Festival Network and the Labor Goes to the Movies podcast. These open discussions will continue during the month of May on Thursdays at 7p ET as part of the DC Labor FilmFest; RSVP here.

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 #AdrianPrawica @GeorgetownKILWP @JosephMcCartin @stevebrier @DCLaborFilmFest

In Part 2 of our chat with Todd Hitchcock, Director of Programming at the American Film Institute Silver Theatre and Cultural Center, he picks out some of his favorite selections in the 2021 DC Labor FilmFest, now underway in the AFI’s Virtual Screening Room.

The new film Haymarket: The Bomb, the Anarchists, the Labor Struggle is being screened free online today by the Global Labor Film Festival Network, and includes two online discussions with director Adrian Prawica on May Day, Saturday, May 1, one at 8p Eastern time with labor historians Joe McCartin (Georgetown University) and Steve Brier(CUNY School of Labor), the other at 8p Pacific time with Labor Studies Professor Dana Frank (UC Santa Cruz).  

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 #AdrianPrawica @GeorgetownKILWP @JosephMcCartin @stevebrier @DCLaborFilmFest

Chris talks with Todd Hitchcock, Director of Programming at the American Film Institute Silver Theatre and Cultural Center. In Part 1 of our chat with Todd, he talks about how AFI has kept the movies coming during the pandemic, and we get a peek behind the glitz and glamour of attending star-studded film festivals at Cannes, Berlin and Toronto, as Todd reveals some of the workaday details of being a film programmer at one of the nation’s premier movie art houses.
Today’s show also includes the trailer for Work Songs, which opens the 2021 DC Labor FilmFest this week.

The new film Haymarket: The Bomb, the Anarchists, the Labor Struggle is being screened free online now by the Global Labor Film Festival Network, and includes two online discussions with director Adrian Prawica on May Day, Saturday, May 1, one at 8p Eastern time with labor historians Joe McCartin (Georgetown University) and Steve Brier(CUNY School of Labor), the other at 8p Pacific time with Labor Studies Professor Dana Frank (UC Santa Cruz).  

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 #AdrianPrawica @GeorgetownKILWP @JosephMcCartin @stevebrier @DCLaborFilmFest

Chris and Elise talk with director Adrian Prawica about his new film Haymarket: The Bomb, the Anarchists, the Labor Struggle, which is being screened free online this coming week by the Global Labor Film Festival Network, which will also include two online discussions with Adrian on May Day, Saturday, May 1, one at 8p Eastern time with labor historians Joe McCartin (Georgetown University) and Steve Brier (CUNY School of Labor), the other at 8p Pacific time with Labor Studies Professor Dana Frank (UC Santa Cruz).

Adrian is an award-winning cinematographer, director, video producer, and content creator. Based in Chicago, his work in journalism, documentary and advertising has been seen on major television networks in the United States and abroad by millions of viewers. He’s done everything from Super Bowl commercials to award-winning documentary films; he’s a certified Phantom Flex high speed camera operator and tech, and he works with both the Arri Alexa, and RED cameras, and we talk about how technology has democratized filmmaking. Adrian was born in Poland and immigrated to the United States at the age of ten, and we also explore how that background has informed his filmmaking.

You can also celebrate May Day by watching Work Songs (we interviewed director Mark Street on our April 9 show); get your tickets here. And stay tuned for updates very soon on the upcoming 2021 DC Labor FilmFest line-up!

Produced by Chris Garlock

@AFISilver @dclabor @LaborHeritage1 #AdrianPrawica @GeorgetownKILWP @JosephMcCartin @stevebrier

Chris talks with director (Matewan, 8 Men Out) and novelist (Union Dues, Yellow Earth) John Sayles, about Martin Eden, Pietro Marcello’s adaptation of Jack London’s autobiographical novel. “The part both in the book and the movie that always meant the most to me is the part where he's whacking away at that typewriter,” says Sayles. “I actually had an electric typewriter; it was the first thing I ever bought with my own money from shoveling driveways in the winter and mowing lawns and things like that. I had a whole wall papered with rejection slips.” Sayles has a lot of insight into the film, not only as a director and writer, but from the perspective of a politically engaged artist. CLICK HERE to watch the video version!

Martin Eden trailer here. 

Celebrate May Day by watching Work Songs! Get your tickets here. And stay tuned for updates on the 2021 DC Labor FilmFest line-up.

Produced by Chris Garlock

Elise and Chris talk with director Mark Street, whose latest film is Work Songs, which travels across the country talking with ordinary working folks; cab drivers, a farmer, longshore-women, a barista. Inspired by the work of the great Studs Terkel, Work Songs is a kaleidoscopic portrait of the United States at work as we face threats from automation, the gig economy and the decline of unions.
Celebrate May Day by watching Work Songs! Get your tickets here.
Other links:
Oiltowns (2017)
Happy? (2000)
In Defense of Street Photography in an iPhone Age
Spotify playlist for WORK SONGS: enjoy, add and share work-related songs! 

Coming up in the DC Labor FilmFest: MARTIN EDEN (April 14); CLICK HERE for tickets; Post-screening Q&A with filmmaker and novelist John Sayles!

Produced by Chris Garlock

NOTE: these films are all available online in AFI Silver’s Virtual Screening Room, along with two upcoming films in the DC Labor FilmFest Spring Mini-Series:
LAPSIS (April 7, 7p ET) CLICK HERE for tickets; Post-screening Q&A moderated by labor journalist Sarah Jaffe, with Katie Parker, Administrative Organizer for NPEU, the Non Profit Employees Union and EPI Policy Analyst Margaret Poydock.
MARTIN EDEN (April 14, 7p ET); CLICK HERE for tickets; Post-screening Q&A with filmmaker and novelist John Sayles.

Produced by Chris Garlock

Elise and Chris discuss films from the DC Labor Filmfest Spring Screening Series with Andrea Arenas, Communications & Policy Coordinator for the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, and co-host of the El Desvio podcast (She’ll be doing the Q&A for IDENTIFYING FEATURES [SIN SEÑAS PARTICULARES] on Wednesday, March 31). We’re also joined by labor journalist Sarah Jaffe, author of Work Won't Love You Back: How Devotion to Our Jobs Keeps Us Exploited, Exhausted and Alone. Sarah also cohosts the terrific Belabored podcast (she’s doing the Q&A for LAPSIS Wed, April 7; 7:00 p.m. ET).

We talk about our first movies, about the things we’re missing from being stuck watching movies at home during the pandemic, and we even have some tips on how to watch scary movies. Grab your popcorn, sit back and relax, and enjoy the show!

Includes clips from Chaplin’s Modern Times, King Kong (1933), and trailers for Identifying Features and Lapsis. The DC Labor Filmfest Spring Screening Series is co-presented by the AFI Silver Theatre and the DC Labor FilmFest.

CLICK HERE to see the video version of the podcast!

Produced by Chris Garlock

Includes trailer for A Woman’s Work and Salt of the Earth.

CLICK HERE to watch the video version!

Produced by Chris Garlock. 

Elise and Chris talk pandemics, movies and class with Tom Zaniello, a film and media scholar who has written several books on films about work and class, including Working Stiffs, Union Maids, Reds, and Riffraff, The Cinema of Globalization, and The Cinema of the Precariat. He recently posted Not Just Viruses: What Epidemic Cinema Teaches Us about Working-Class Vulnerability on the Working Class Perspectives blog. Watch the video version on Empathy Labs.

Includes clips from District 9, Brother From Another Planet and Contagion. Outro clip from Brother From Another Planet.

CLICK HERE to watch the video version!

Labor Goes to the Movies is produced by Chris Garlock

On this first episode, Elise remembers that her neighborhood in Southeast Detroit didn’t have a movie theater so she’d walk to one in nearby River Rouge, where the films were big and in color, in contrast to the little black-and-white television set at home. Then Danny Schur – composer and producer of Stand! the musical about the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike – drops by to share his own childhood memories of going to the movies at a huge theater in his tiny hometown of Ethelbert, 200 miles north of Winnipeg, Canada. “There were only maybe 1,000 people in town and half of them could fit into the theater.” Danny also discusses music, theater, why the actor’s clothes in Stand! are so clean and why every local union should buy the Black Magic 6.  
Includes Stand, sung by Lisa Bell. Click here to see the movie!

You can also watch this episode on YouTube.

Labor Goes to the Movies is produced by Chris Garlock