Blue Collar . Memphis Flyer . 11-17-97

Blue Collar

DIRECTED BY: Paul Schrader

REVIEWED: 11-17-97

That genuinely political labor films are rare in proportion to the issue's impact on American life may have something to do with Hollywood's belief that escapsims is what we crave most. But more likely it is because honest, serious and provocative material about the lives of the working class is not calculated to please the capitalists who finance movies or their most desired demographics. What then to make of Blue Collar?

The directorial debut by Taxi Driver screenwriter Paul Schrader explores life on the Detroit auto assembly lines, focusing on the plight of three workers played by Harvey Keitel, Yaphet Kotto, and Richard Pryor, who gives his best feature-film performance in his only dramatic role. The three men at the center of the film lead lives marked by low wages and large debts, lives where the plant, as Pryor's character says at a union meeting, seems short for plantation.

Where Blue Collar differs from other labor films, from Salt of the Earth to Norma Rae to Matewan, is that it is not a pro-union film. The union depicted here seems indifferent and ineffectual at first, but as the film progresses the extent of union corruption and complicity in maintaining the status quo is revealed. Blue Collar's only allegiance is to the worker, but it refuses to romanticize even him. The men in this film do drugs, cheat on their wives, and commit crimes. They're desperate -- desperate to stay alive, physically and spiritually. As systemic forces from the company to the union to the government conspire to divide them, the film conjures a mood of both anger and despair. No Hollywood ending here. Blue Collar is not liberal in tone or perspective, it is radical. That it got made by a major American filmmaker with prominent actors is surprising. That it is little know today is not.

--Chris Herrington

Other Films by Paul Schrader
Affliction
Touch

Film Vault Suggested Links
In the Company of Men
The Twilight of the Golds
Higher Learning

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