Directed by Barbara Kopple • 1976 • United States
Barbara Kopple’s Academy Award-winning HARLAN COUNTY USA unflinchingly documents a grueling coal miners’ strike in a small Kentucky town. With unprecedented access, Kopple and her crew captured the miners’ sometimes violent struggles with strikebreakers, local police, and company thugs. Featuring a haunting soundtrack, with legendary country and bluegrass artists Hazel Dickens, Merle Travis, Sarah Gunning, and Florence Reece, the film is a heartbreaking record of the thirteen-month struggle between a community fighting to survive and a corporation dedicated to the bottom line.
Up Next in Cinema Verité
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Running Fence
Directed by Albert Maysles, David Maysles, and Charlotte Zwerin • 1977 • United States
RUNNING FENCE depicts the long struggle by the artists, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, to build a 24 mile fence of white fabric over the hills of California disappearing into the Pacific. Cost: 3 million dollars. ...
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Always for Pleasure
Directed by Les Blank • 1978 • United States
his 1978 documentary is Les Blank’s celebration of the spirit and social traditions of New Orleans, featuring Mardi Gras and St. Patrick’s Day celebrations as well as musical performances by Allen Toussaint, Kid Thomas Valentine, Professor Longhair, a...
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Burden of Dreams
Directed by Les Blank • 1982 • United States
For nearly five years, acclaimed German filmmaker Werner Herzog desperately tried to complete one of the most ambitious and difficult films of his career, FITZCARRALDO, the story of one man’s attempt to build an opera house deep in the Amazon jungle. ...
