Labor Culture

 “Working Man,”film by Robert Jury, 2020

It's the standard 'rust belt' town in the north – named 'Orridge' but really Norridge, Illinois – a place that stands in for many other cities decimated by plant closings. Allery is an older, stocky, light-skinned worker who doesn't talk much, eats his lunch alone and works diligently. It's the last day at a plastics factory, (a real closed plant in Norridge, IL) as the owners have an unknown plan in mind and are laying everyone off. Yet they've left parts and raw materials all over the place.

Allery has other plans. The younger folks get their last paychecks at 1:00 P.M. and are paid all day. He continues to work until the old closing time, 4:30 PM. The plant manager hands him his last paycheck. Allery has a long-suffering wife, Iola, he barely talks to. He's obviously depressed, as they lost their older son to suicide. The next day he watches telly and finds nothing on. He seems to have no interests. He goes to the unemployment office and his fellow workers mention its a 2 hour wait for part-time jobs, so he turns around. He takes a walk every night down towards the river and bridges, and you'd swear he's going to jump in.

That's the setup, but what comes next was already hinted at. As a Marxist would say, a factory is not 'private property' but is really owned by the labor of those who spent years there. Like 'common law' marriage or an uncontested boundary line or road, habit and occupation become ownership. The next day Allery is seen trundling down the street towards the plant in his work clothes, his lunchbox and Stanley thermos. His former compadres look at him from their front porches and wonder 'WTF?' He jimmies open an old back door, gets into the plant, starts his machine but there is no power. He instead gets out cleaning supplies and begins to clean the whole place. He takes his break with a powdered donut and for lunch a vile liverwurst sandwich on Wonder Bread. (This is an old-fashioned guy.) The co-workers on the porches watch him walk home and are astonished once more. This goes on for several days until the foreman shows up with the police and tells him to leave.

Plastics factories are toxic places to work, but no one here seemed to wear breathing protection, just a few fans. There seems to be no union. There are no guards at the plant or preparation for something else. Nor does the movie mention that he could apply for unemployment insurance. That is not this story.

Republic Windows and Doors UE Occupation

Finally a newer worker, a tall dark-skinned brother named Walter, talks to Allery about how he has a door key the company forgot. He goes with Allery to the plant, they get in another door and Allery starts cleaning again. Walter calls the power company and gets the electricity turned on. They begin making parts in their plastic stamping / extrusion machines. Eventually other former workers are curious and show up. It starts as an ebony and ivory 'buddy' picture but becomes an occupation of the closed factory. They intend to stay inside the plant for at least a week to produce on suspended orders.  They invite family too. This is probably based on a real factory occupation in Chicago at Republic Windows and Doors in 2008, led mostly be Latino workers.

The plan, which is Walter's, is to fulfill the orders left undone and put pressure on the company to keep the building open and save the remaining jobs. The factory had 500 workers originally, and is now down to around 50. The company hears about the occupation on the news and is afraid to call the police – at first. The wife, Iola, is suspicious of Walter, him having a beard and being non-white, and refuses to join her husband and the neighbors in the plant.

What happens? The best scenes are in the plant, as this is a real work place, not a set. Anyone whose spent time in one will be at home. Unfortunately Walter has a volcanic temper and a drinking problem, even though he's been portrayed as the brains of the bunch. After being threatened with arrest, and with the power shut off again, most of the workers still agree to stick it out, including Alery. However no outside labor movement shows up for them and only one lonely reporter. The screen-writer / director tanks the film from here, basing everything on a major lie told by Walter, who is still correct as it turns out. The film shows the most radical worker to be manipulative and maybe crazy. They win a larger severance and a production bonus and abandon the plant nevertheless.

It ends as a tear-jerker buddy picture, a renewed marriage and a liberated Alery and Iola – ultimately a personal story. This film is a product of the wreckage of industrial production by technology, off-shoring, maquiladoras and sending work to the U.S. South. No one thinks of forming an ESOP / employee ownership to buy the plant, though they probably couldn't given the small number of workers left. Nor is a plan for the factory, its materials or machines, ever clear or mentioned. It just sits there, which is not realistic.  Nevertheless, the basic premise is all too real.

Prior blog reviews on this subject, use blog search box, upper left, to investigate our 17 year archive, using these terms: “Striking to Survive,” “Factory Days” (Gibbs); “Polar Star” (Cruz); “Living and Dying on the Factory Floor,” “Autopsy of an Engine,” “Night Shift,” “China On Strike,” “Jasic Factory Struggle,” “The Unseen” (Belestrini); “Red Baker,” “On the Line.”

Tot Kultur Kommissar

April 22, 2024