“Harlan County USA” Screening
2022-2023 Screenings
Wednesday, November 16, 2022
6 PM
Harlan County USA (Barbara Kopple, 1976)
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.
Stream the film on your own and then join us for a conversation led by Dr. Mark Cunningham.
Register Here
STREAM EPISODES FOR FREE ON KANOPY
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Austin Public Library users also have access to Kanopy. More information on accessing Canopy through the Austin Public Library system can be found here.
CO-DISCUSSANT
Anne comes out of a movement to make media that helps create opportunity for social change. She has made documentary films (always with limited resources) since the 1970¹s and was associate director and assistant camerawoman for HARLAN COUNTY, USA. She is also a Professor of Practice at the University of Texas’ Department of Radio-Television-Film.
Documentaries she produced, directed, and edited include: ANNE BRADEN: SOUTHERN PATRIOT co-directed with Mimi Pickering (Texas Observer screening at the Alamo Drafthouse, 2013 Kentucky History Award, KY Historical Society) about the extraordinary life of a civil rights leader; MORRISTOWN: IN THE AIR AND SUN (Austin Film Festival, AMBULANTE ) a working class critique of globalization, TO SAVE THE LAND AND PEOPLE (SXSW, Texas Documentary Tour) a history of a militant grassroots environmental movement; JUSTICE IN THE COALFIELDS (INTERCOM gold plaque) about the community impact of the Pittston strike; ON OUR OWN LAND (duPont-Columbia award for independent broadcast journalism) about the citizens’ movement to stop broad form deed strip mining; and CHEMICAL VALLEY co-directed with Mimi Pickering (P.O.V., American Film and Video Blue Ribbon) about environmental racism and most recently, SHELTER (Honorable Mention, New Jersey International Film Festival) which tells the stories of 5 West Virginia women as they try to find freedom, justice and safety.
Her documentary, FAST FOOD WOMEN, about women struggling to raise families in minimum wage jobs with no benefits, received national airing on P.O.V. and was part of a Learning Channel series of films about women by women.
Anne recently completed A STRIKE AND AN UPRISING (IN TEXAS). Films in progress include TENDER PROMISE: EDUCATION STORY an intimate look at public education and 2 short films for children based on A STRIKE AND AN UPRISING (IN TEXAS).
Her intent is to create meaningful work, tell the truth about working class Americans, and contribute to the vitality of independent filmmaking.