FilmWorks United (2011)
(Scheduled time is approximate)

July 5 (Tuesday) (Donation) 522 Valencia - near 16th St., SF
(Due to the construction unfinished at 518 Valencia at this time, we have to show it upstairs - 522 Valencia - Sorry, wheel chair not accessible)
6:00
The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman
(65 min.) 2011
Produced, directed, filmed and edited by; Julie Cavanagh (teacher), Darren Marrelli (school social worker), Norm Scott (retired teacher), Mollie Bruhn (teacher), Lisa Donlan (parent).
It is the antidote to the massive propaganda campaign to push privatization of education in the film “Waiting For Superman” last year. The film was also made by teachers and parents and is an antidote to the pro-privatization propaganda.
The organized coordinated destruction of public education through charter schools and making the schools “profit centers” pushed by the Bill Gates Foundation and the Broad Foundation is a critical issue for all those interested in defending public education.
Teachers from San Francisco will join the discussion following the film. 
There will be a Photo display by Kilo of the more than 70,000 educators and other members of the Seccion 22 teachers’ movement in Oaxaca, Mexico, who are striking and taking occupation action against privatization and the destruction of public education pushed by US billionaires and Arnie Duncan, Obama’s secretary of Education.
www.waitingforsupermantruth.org
(Discussion follows)

7:45
Backyard (el traspatio) (122 min.) (2009)
Directed by Carlos Carrera   
Sabina Berman, the most important screenwriter in Mexico has written a powerful screenplay on the conditions and causes of the attacks of women in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. In an epidemic of murders, thousands of women workers in Juarez have been kidnapped and killed.  We learn about their conditions and the war zone in Mexico, which are the center of this detective mystery. Behind the story is the role of NAFTA and the “Free Trade” zone imposed by the US on Mexico.  While promising to “help” Mexico, NAFTA has created a slave labor union free environment for multi-nationals with a militarized drug war that threatens the lives of people throughout the region. Chelis Lopez of Radio Bi-Lingual will participate in a discussion after the film.

July 8 (Friday) (Donation) 522 Valencia - near 16th St., SF
(Due to the construction unfinished at 518 Valencia at this time, we have to show it upstairs - 522 Valencia - Sorry, wheel chair not accessible)
6:00
Women On Strike (23 min.) 2010 Turkey
Directed by Güliz Saglam, Feryal Sayg?l?gil
A critique of our consumer-driven model of economic growth and its supreme cost to our planet and the quality of our lives. This film outlines what drives the US economy and why the market is breaking down. http://www.bullfrogfilms.com/print/wefa.html

6:30
Red Dust (20 min.) (2010) - China
By Karin T. Mak
Red cadmium dust drifted freely in China’s nickel-cadmium battery factories owned and operated by GP BATTERIES (GP), one of the world’s top battery manufacturers. Ren, a migrant worker originally from Sichuan, suffers from frequent headaches and breathing difficulties. If untreated, the cadmium poisoning can lead to kidney failure, cancer, and even death.
RED DUST tells an unexamined side of China’s economic development: the resistance, courage, and hope of workers battling occupational disease, demanding justice from the local government and global capital. Chinese migrant workers are deemed disposable by factory owners and are stereotypically viewed as quiet and passive victims. However, Ren and other GP workers (Min, Fu, and Wu) fight back. Labor issues are very sensitive in China, and workers who publicly discuss their struggles do so at great risk. The audience discovers along with the filmmaker, a Chinese American, the horrors of the global assembly line.  http://www.reddustdocumentary.org

7:00
Whose Conspitacy, Justice For The Shrewsbury Pickets
(40 min.) (2010) - UK
By Chris Reeves of Platform Films  
This documentary shows the frame up and political victimization of 24 Shrewsbury building trades workers after their successful 1972 building trades workers strike. Two of them Des Warren and Ricky Tomlinson were jailed for years on conspiracy charges after the original criminal charges were dropped against the workers in order to make them an example of what happens to trade unionists when you fight back. The video includes interviews with Des Warren and other workers about how this struggle affected their lives. This has important lessons for all US workers who face an effort to criminalize effective trade unionism from the use of the Taft-Hartley to growing anti-labor legislation aimed at destroying organizing labor. Discussion to follow the film. Platform.films@virgin.net  http://www.shrewsburypicketscampaign.org.uk/
(Discussion follows)

8:30
Last Stand At Mymboida (56 min.) Australia
By Jeff Bird
Thirty miners in an Australian primitive mine in the Nymboida Valley in Northern New South Wales are faced with the sack in 1975 but in a last desperate action to save the jobs, they decide to take over the mine and run it themselves. Although this was illegal under the law and they had no management experience, they decided that they had no other choice. “Their enthusiasm and hard work lead to a miraculous transformation – and against all expectations the mine was soon turning a profit!” This story of workers control was a important experience of the ability of workers to take over and run their jobs without corporate management. Despite all odds the workers were successful. On March 11, 1975 the company capitulated and the company handed over the mine to the men and their union, the Miners Federation. This historic battle can now be seen in America.
http://www.nymboidadoco.com.au/

July 22 (Friday) (Donation) 522 Valencia - near 16th St., SF
Location moved from 518 Valencia
6:00
Women's Work Songs (48 min.) (2011)
By Filiz Bingolce
Work life is one of the most important areas in which woman creativity develops. Women produce melodic forms while working and in this powerful film the women voice their resistance, insurgence and struggles in their work songs. We learn about their real lives both personal and political as they sing out about their life.

7:00
A Moment (7 min.) (2010) - Turkey
By Nazli Bayram
The short is about the increasing speed up of workers who are tied to machine production speeds. The murderous pace puts these workers in a nightmare situation where they lose their limbs, hands and their bodies are destroyed by increasing exploitation on the job. nbayram@anadolu.edu.tr

7:15
Many Straws Make A Nest (50 min.) (2010) Germany/India
By KanalB
In the last 20 years, the Delhi region has turned into one of the world’s major industrial hubs. The required workforce is recruited from India’s poorer regions, where survival is being made more and more difficult for the rural populace.
This is why 4.5 million industrial workers in Southern Delhi are willing to ruin their health for wages their families can hardly survive on. People are almost powerless in this situation, but still they try to find effective ways to collectively resist.

8:15
Locked Out   (58 min.) 2010
By Joan Sekler
This film tells the story of the ILWU Local 30 borax miners who are in a battle with Rio Tinto, one of the largest mining companies in the world. Through the film we learn about the efforts of the local in Boron, California to organize a fightback that spans the world.
Discussion with director Joan Sekler following the film
www.lockedout2010.org
(Discussion follows)

July 29 (Friday) (Donation) 522 Valencia - near 16th St., SF
Location moved from 518 Valencia
6:00
3 Minute Videos from LaborFest Japan (30 min.) 2010
Every year, LaborFest Japan has a video competition for the best three minute videos. These videos, which are being screened at LaborFest 2011 show the life of working people in Japan.

6:40
Koji Ariyoshi (57min.) 2004
By The Center for Labor Education & Research Hawaii
Koji Ariyoshi was born in a coffee plantation in Hawaii in 1914 and later worked on the docks in Hawaii and San Francisco where he also worked with ILWU Local 10 member
Karl Yoneda. He became a newspaper publisher and journalist and was incarcerated during the 2nd world war and later went to Yenan, China. When he returned to Hawaii, he was part of the Hawaii Seven who were prosecuted for being members of the CP.
http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2005/May/05/il/il01a.html

7:45
Breathtaking  (43 min.) 2010 Canada
By Kathleen Mullen
Filmmaker Kathleen Mullen’s father died from Mesothelioma and she seeks answers about his death. Through films of her father’s struggle for his health and his legal battles, along with the international connections, including India, make this a film not only about one worker’s contamination and death but also about international connections.
www.kathleenmullen.com/breathtaking/

8:30
Living By My Principles (61 min.) 2010 Japan
This film shows the lives of three Japanese teachers: Kimiko Nezu (home economics teacher), Miwako Sato (music teacher) and Nobuo Dohi (High School Principal), who are opposing the growing militarization of Japan. The government has demanded that all teachers stand up for the national flag and sing the national anthem, which supports the reactionary emperor system. Right wing nationalist politicians have launched a campaign to fire those teachers who are brave enough to stand up to these demands. Hundreds of teachers have been disciplined for refusing to stand and have been fired and discriminated against. The film shows how these teachers’ lives have changed in the process of fighting for their principles. As Kimiko Nezu has said, she believes “children need to be able to think on their own, and not be blind followers. As an educator, I have a responsibility to teach them to be independent thinkers.” The struggle to defend these teachers’ democratic and human rights continues today in Japan.
www.doi-toshikuni.net/e/index.html

9:30
FALSE PROFITS, Global Capitalism and South Africa (48 min.) 2009
Produced & directed by: AIDC & WWMP
The first documentary film for both organisations and it focuses on the current global economic crisis – its impact on the working class and the responses by trade unions, government and big business in South Africa. It includes interviews with leading trade unionists, workers, community members, NGO workers and academics. The film is decidedly leftwing and critical in its approach and attempts to explain the crisis in Marxist terms and poses serious questions about alternative responses to the crisis, that constantly impacts negatively on the working class and the world’s poor. Moreover, this current crisis is also ecological and renders capitalism unsustainable and a threat to life on Earth.
www.wwmp.org.za