From Wharf Rats to Lords of the Docks

This movie features one of our American working-class heroes. It is perfectly ironic that he was an Aussie. What a lesson for those considering immigration restrictions today!

This film should be required in all secondary schools worldwide. Bravo Ian Ruskin and Haskell Wexler!

Combining drama and theater with historical footage, this film brings to life the tumultuous times when working people in America made a great leap forward. All such movements require leaders who can make others believe that their lives are worth so much more than what some boss is willing to pay them for their labor.

Indeed, there is Strength in Unity. An Injury to One is an Injury to All!

Buy this DVD; get it on the air in your community.

With all the things happening in America today this is a film everyone needs to see.

Through the life of Harry Bridges I learned so much about the beginnings of worker rights (longshoremen specifically) and labor history; unionization. The story covers the US depression up to the '70s - including the McCarthy era, and much more. Harry was on the cover of Time Magazine twice, spied on by the FBI, the US spent 21 years trying to deport him without success, and as an Aussie immigrant he spent his life making our Democracy live up to it's promise of equality for every man.

Ian Ruskin inhabits Harry as no one else could. I came away inspired by both Harry, who made a difference, and Ian who continues to make a difference by sharing Harry's life with us.

Very funny movie with a wicked sense of humor. Great music-and hours of amazing special features-Arlo Guthie, Sarah Lee Guthrie, Jackson Browne, and more.

"Wharf Rats" is a very cleverly written and flawlessly performed documentary of the life of labor leader, Harry Bridges. It is a touching and inspirational film.

From his childhood in Australia, to his life as a merchant mariner, labor leader and his retirement, Ian Ruskin, the writer and star of the one-man play, has captured the essence of Harry Bridges and the times in which he lived.

The film captures the joys, sorrows, trials and tribulations of Harry Bridges and the labor movement from some of its darkest hours to one of its major triumphs. It also reveals the internal strife that is the labor movement and the beauty and weakness of the democratic process.

It is both a condemnation of the political/legal process and a testimony to the importance of the U.S. Constitution as the protector of the rights of the people.

«From Wharf Rats to Lords of the Docks» is one of the last documentaries directed by Haskell Wexler (1922-2015), the renowned Jewish-American cinematographer who shot such classics as «One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest», «The Conversation» AND «Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?», for which he won his first Oscar.

It is no news to anyone that Wexler was a liberal activist, who was never lacking in accusations of being radical, communist, or rebellious, for addressing issues that were not liked by the Los Angeles film industry, such as poverty, racism, civil riots, the wars in Vietnam and Central America, the assassinations of leaders, and other controversial facts in the United States. It is consistent, therefore, that Wexler was drawn to the life of socialist and anti-fascist folk singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie (in «Bound for Glory», for which he won his second Oscar for photography); or that of the prominent Australian trade unionist and labor leader Harry Bridges, who was a key figure in the creation of the North American port unions.

The result was the entertaining film «From Wharf Rats to Lords of the Docks» (2007). The starting point was playwright and actor Ian Ruskin's monologue, a funny and fast-paced retelling of the activist's life, which Bridges himself (played by Ruskin) recounts to the audience. Always with a high spirit, humor and irony, Bridges recounts incidents and anecdotes of his life, reads letters, press releases and court verdicts, in which he gives an account of the almost three decades in which influential figures in North American political and economic scenes tried to deport him, for his defense of the six-hour work schedule, better wages, the defense of the right to work of African-Americans, labor participation in the contracts. And other achievements.

Wexler filmed the performance of the monologue at the Warner Grand Theater in San Pedro, California; and illustrated various moments with photos, films clips, and a couple of re-enactments of Bridges' meetings with dockworkers. In just 78 minutes, Wexler, Ruskin, and the assembled team, with the songs of Pete Seeger, performed by Jackson Browne, the Guthries (Woody, Arlo, and Sarah), David Mora, Ciro Hurtado and Tim Reynolds, tell us with simplicity and wit a chapter of the organization of the workers of the world for labor dignity and raising their standard of living.

This is very topical at the moment. Global warming is frightening the politicians, who have passed horrific terrorism laws and biker gang laws, that can be used against the ordinary working man. No doubt to be used when things get worse. The bankers have collected the peoples money and houses. A look back at the history of the struggles, through the depression and union repression, can show us what is being planning for us. You will be glad that Harry Bridges overcame working mens' enemies and stopped the deportation plot. He is one of many United States heroes that paved the way to a future. That of course hasn't stopped the anti worker plots, it has just made them more devious. Folksingers such as Pete Seeger, Arlo and Woodie Guthrie are well worth having a look at afterward's on You Tube with songs like Harry Simms, Joe Hill etc about other working men heroes. One can only thank the union and the Harry Bridges Project for their sterling work in presenting this. Watch it, enjoy and learn how to protect us from the greedy men. Harry Bridges Project Harry Bridges Project Harry Bridges Project Harry Bridges Project