MATEWAN Free Screening + discussion

Sometimes we need to look back at history to find strength to continue the struggles for justice we are currently facing. Along with our siblings at Trilingua Cinema, we invite you this Thursday, January 15th at 6pm for a free screening at ESFL of the epic film MATEWAN.

This film will be screened for free as part of our Reel Stories: Labor in Film series, presented in collaboration with East Side Freedom Library and the ESFL Labor Advisory Committee.

January 15th, 6:00pm
East Side Freedom Library
1105 Greenbrier Street, St Paul

“It makes history sing,”

-Michael Willmington, The Los Angeles Times

Start your new year with a free labor film series. TriLingua Cinema brings three landmark films to the East Side Freedom
Library, each illuminating the struggles, victories, and everyday courage of working people. Each film will be introduced by a local scholar-activist who will also lead a post-film conversation.

Starring James Earl Jones, “Matewan” is a dramatic film about the early 1920s mine wars in West Virginia. Leading the discussion of the film will be Gary Kaunonen, the Education and Program Manager at the Minnesota Discovery Center in Chisholm. He is the author of three terrific books about immigrant iron and copper miners in the early 20th century, and he is also a documentary filmmaker. His “Northern Minnesota’s Labor Wars” looks at strikes in 1916 and 1917 and their significance to World War I-era repression and deportations. We can count on Gary to help us tie the West Virginia labor story to our own Minnesota history, and to put the past challenges faced by immigrant workers in conversation with those of our present moment.

Synopsis

IT TAKES MORE THAN GUNS TO KILL A MAN.
Filmed in the coal country of West Virginia, “Matewan” celebrates labor organizing in the context of a 1920s work stoppage. Union organizer, Joe Kenehan, a scab named “Few Clothes” Johnson and a sympathetic mayor and police chief heroically fight the power represented by a coal company and Matewan’s vested interests so that justice and workers’ rights need not take a back seat to squalid working conditions, exploitation and the bottom line.

This film is rated PG-13. Parents or guardians are encouraged to consult the IMDB Parents Guide.

This film will be screened in English with English subtitles.