ken-roberts-1 I was fascinated by this documentary and wanted to see more. Then the long, never-ending series of animal murders began. I am not an animal activist but I should be, because nothing bothers me more than to see a human being kill an animal. Those scenes made Hannibal Lector look like an alter boy.The horror of it - I watched for 3 minutes or so and had to turn it off. Each animal saw and smelled all the death around him as he was dragged around in the mud, waiting his turn. The twitching bodies of those still not quite dead . . . too much. I realize that those people did it to feed and support themselves - but I will never forget those scenes. Maybe that was the point.

revolutioner "Workingman's Death" is a difficult movie to review. The first segment about Ukranians mining coal from small illegal mines in one of the coldest, most remote spots on the planet, is fascinating. We follow these hard workers on their journey to and from the mines. We visit the home of a miner and meet his wife and the family (a baby goat) and the entire segment was delightful. Next, we travel to Indonesia and see some incredible footage of men extracting sulfur from the mountains and this too, is something that you have probably never seen before. There are some very funny moments as well and this story was also a winner.What I found much less compelling were the final two stories about Pakistanis taking apart giant ships no longer being used and an obsolete power plant in China that has been turned into a park. Unique...yes. Interesting...not really.The ugliness came in the form of a segment about workers in Nigeria. Honestly, if I knew about this beforehand, there is zero chance that I would have attended this screening. It begins with animal horns being tossed onto a large pile and then we see several large animals being led to an area. At this point, my sensors were activated. I was saying to myself...please God--let this be some sort of African rodeo...but when I heard voices shouting and the subtitles read INNARDS..SKIN...INNARDS!, I bolted out of the theater at record speed. The bloodbath apparently continued for about 25 minutes. Since I didn't witness this horror show, here is the description in the festival program guide: "A purer form of hell is found in a Nigerian slaughter yard where the bleating animals (graphically portrayed) seem more human than the men and women killing, portioning, roasting, selling—and praying." All-righty then! Now at least you know that this isn't going to be the "feel good hit of the summer"...In the Q and A following the film, director Michael Glawogger was quite charming in talking about his work. Someone asked if it will be seen on television. Glawogger was hopeful, saying that he expected that it would eventually make it to the small screen. I can tell you with absolute certainty, that this will NEVER be seen on American television in any way shape or form, unless the Nigerian segment is deleted.A DVD will probably be released in the future, and until then, "Workingman's Death" will enjoy a limited release in the U.S.

James McNally I saw this film at the 2005 Toronto International Film Festival. After you see this film, you'll never complain about your job again. Subtitled something like "Five Portraits of Work in the Twenty-First Century," Glawogger's documentary features some of the most dangerous, difficult, or just plain unpleasant work in the world.Each segment except the last one is about twenty-five minutes long, and is shot without any voice-over narration and very little editorializing. We are simply presented with people working and talking about their work. The director possesses a very painterly sense of composition, and we're often presented with shots of workers posing as if they were in front of a still camera. The camera-work is even more impressive when it is moving, and I often found myself wondering how they were able to film in some of these conditions.The segments follow, in order, a group of miners in Ukraine who have dug their own coal shafts, a group of men in Indonesia who collect sulfur from an active volcano and haul it down the mountainside, butchers at an open-air slaughterhouse in Nigeria, men who break apart rusting ships for scrap metal in Pakistan, and steelworkers in China. Although all of these workers are merely surviving, the thing that struck me most was how contented, even happy, most of them were.That being said, three of the five segments featured Islamic societies, and I found myself wondering about the connections between the conditions these men were working in and the rise of Islamic radicalism. Among the shipbreakers in Pakistan, for instance, there was an interesting segment which followed a photographer who circulated among the men charging them a fee to take pictures of them holding an assault rifle. There was no voice-over, but I got the impression that these men wanted to be seen as revolutionaries instead of just subsistence scrap workers.The most intense segment had to be among the butchers, and there was quite a lot of blood and gore evident as we watched the men work. But strangely, I found this a more honest approach to the production of food than I saw in the factory farms in a film like We Feed The World. These butchers are "hands-on," literally.The final segment, filmed among steelworkers in China, was the shortest, and the least interesting, but the director was trying to end with the optimism of the Chinese workers for the steel industry, which he contrasts with shots of a defunct steel mill in Germany that's been turned into an art installation. His point was slightly unclear, but overall, his unflinching eye for detail, even in some harrowing work environments, makes this documentary a must- see.

LeRoyMarko Very good documentary about the working conditions of five groups of workers. Even though it's the twenty-first century, the director wants us to know that a lot of workers across the world have not benefited from the advancement in technology. First, we're off to Ukraine to learn about the work of some coal miners. Their work conditions are just unbelievable. Then, the director brings us to Indonesia to show us the hard work done by the sulfur miners (I didn't know nothing about this line of work). We are then transported to Pakistan, where we are shown the work of ship-breakers. Again, I was unaware that ship "cemetaries" of this sort still existed today. The open slaughterhouse of a Nigerian city is next. Animal activists beware: don't watch! I was just fascinated by the chaos that seems to reign in that place. Finally, we are shown the working conditions in the steel industry of China. All those segments are presented without real context. There's no narration. But it's easy to follow, to get the point. And the images say a thousand words. Beautiful cinematography and very good camera movement. Some times, the camera moves with the subject, Some times, subject and camera are not moving. It's like a photo shot. One thing is for sure, you always feel like you're in the middle of the action. Even though, you see the despair, you can also see hope in what most of these workers say. Watch it. It's a great eye-opener.Seen at the Toronto International Film Festival (at the Cumberland Cinemas), on September 17th, 2005.87/100 (***½)