Other Resources
Interested in watching and sharing with others more labor films you may have missed? Besides reviewing films shown at and listed in the conference segment of this site, here are a few initial suggestions of labor labor-related documentary and feature films, examining and portraying the past, present, and possible futures. Some are available for rental, some from free sources.
If there's a film you want to see and are having trouble locating it, contact us for more information. And let us know if there are other films we should highlight. You can search many more films, documentary and feature, at the Labor Film Database https://laborfilms.com/
10,000 Black Men Named George (2002): Feature film about A. Philip Randolph and black Pullman car workers organize the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in the 1920s.
A Day's Work (2015): Temporary workers, safety on the job, the temp worker industry
Bread and Roses (2000): Feature film based on the Justice for Janitors campaign in Los Angeles.
Finally Got the News (1970): Documentary about the League of Revolutionary Black Workers organized around struggles and outside Detroit's factories and unions.
Live Nude Girls Unite! (2000): Created by one of the workers involved, a film about an organizing drive by exotic dancers at a San Francisco club.
Made in Dagenham (2010): Feature film based on the true story of a 1968 strike in Britain where women struck for equal rights and pay equity.
Matewan (1987): Feature film about a 1920 miners' strike in West Virginia. (This strike and the larger history is also covered in The Mine Wars, part of PBS's American Experience series.
Newsies (1992): A musical based on the 1899 New York City Newsboys Strike. Engaging for kids (as well as many adults.)
Norma Rae (1979): Sally Field's Oscar-winning performance about an organizing drive in a southern textile mill)
Salt of the Earth (1954): Mexican-American workers strike in the Southwest, with women playing a critical lead role; most actors were actual workers from the union
Sorry to Bother You (2018): Boots Riley in a dark comedy about workers in the telemarketing industry
The Take: Occupy, Resist, Produce (2004): A documentary about workers in Argentina who fight to take over and run their abandoned factory.
With Babies and Banners (1979): Story of the Women's Emergency Brigade in the UAW-GM strike of 1936-37.
Women of Summer: The Bryn Mawr Summer School for Working Women, 1921-1938 (1985): Documentary about an innovative program based in labor education and social justice organizing for working class women.
Documentary films by Julia Reichert, including Union Maids and Seeing Red
Documentary films by Barbara Kopple, including Harlan County USA and American Dream
If there's a film you want to see and are having trouble locating it, contact us for more information. And let us know if there are other films we should highlight. You can search many more films, documentary and feature, at the Labor Film Database https://laborfilms.com/
10,000 Black Men Named George (2002): Feature film about A. Philip Randolph and black Pullman car workers organize the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in the 1920s.
A Day's Work (2015): Temporary workers, safety on the job, the temp worker industry
Bread and Roses (2000): Feature film based on the Justice for Janitors campaign in Los Angeles.
Finally Got the News (1970): Documentary about the League of Revolutionary Black Workers organized around struggles and outside Detroit's factories and unions.
Live Nude Girls Unite! (2000): Created by one of the workers involved, a film about an organizing drive by exotic dancers at a San Francisco club.
Made in Dagenham (2010): Feature film based on the true story of a 1968 strike in Britain where women struck for equal rights and pay equity.
Matewan (1987): Feature film about a 1920 miners' strike in West Virginia. (This strike and the larger history is also covered in The Mine Wars, part of PBS's American Experience series.
Newsies (1992): A musical based on the 1899 New York City Newsboys Strike. Engaging for kids (as well as many adults.)
Norma Rae (1979): Sally Field's Oscar-winning performance about an organizing drive in a southern textile mill)
Salt of the Earth (1954): Mexican-American workers strike in the Southwest, with women playing a critical lead role; most actors were actual workers from the union
Sorry to Bother You (2018): Boots Riley in a dark comedy about workers in the telemarketing industry
The Take: Occupy, Resist, Produce (2004): A documentary about workers in Argentina who fight to take over and run their abandoned factory.
With Babies and Banners (1979): Story of the Women's Emergency Brigade in the UAW-GM strike of 1936-37.
Women of Summer: The Bryn Mawr Summer School for Working Women, 1921-1938 (1985): Documentary about an innovative program based in labor education and social justice organizing for working class women.
Documentary films by Julia Reichert, including Union Maids and Seeing Red
Documentary films by Barbara Kopple, including Harlan County USA and American Dream