Salt of the Earth (1954 film)
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"Depicting the prejudices faced by Mexican-Americans with a feminist and pro-labor position, this powerful and persuasive, yet long-suppressed and blacklisted film was promptly decried as communist propaganda. A rare and radical classic of American independent and social-realist cinema."
— MUBI’s take
Salt of the Earth (1954 film)
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This film has been preserved in the National Film Registry in 1992.
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Salt of the Earth is a 1954 American drama film written by Michael Wilson, directed by Herbert J. Biberman, and produced by Paul Jarrico. All had been blacklisted by the Hollywood establishment due to their alleged involvement in communist politics.
The drama film is one of the first pictures to advance the feminist social and political point of view. Its plot centers on a long and difficult strike, based on the 1951 strike against the Empire Zinc Company in Grant County, New Mexico. In the film, the company is identified as "Delaware Zinc", and the setting is "Zinctown, New Mexico". The film shows how the miners, the company, and the police react during the strike. In neorealist style, the producers and director used actual miners and their families as actors in the film.
Why It Rocks
- Since the film's inspired by an actual miners strike in New Mexico that lasted for more than a year, Salt of the Earth recounted major incidents in the strike. A notable standout is how miners' wives had been instrumental in the strike, marching in picket lines when members of Local 90 of the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers were prohibited from doing so and eventually more than 85 women going to jail, along with their young children.
- For what may be the first time in an American film history, a strike is depicted exclusively from the militant workers point of view. The film provides semi-documentary details on the specifics of the strike. The Chicanos have legitimate complaints about their working conditions, demanding the same safety regulations and pay as their white miners counterparts.
- With the film produced by blacklisted Hollywood filmmakers due to alleged Communist sympathies -- Director Herbert Biberman was one of the Hollywood Ten, and while neither screenwriter Michael Wilson nor producer Jarrico were among that particular number, they were also blacklisted -- the story was decidedly leftist, anticapitalist and pro-union. Although the film was made available to union groups, churches and schools, few theater owners were willing to book it due to the blacklisted party. Although the film would eventually become a success, with status growing in subsequent decades, along with its influence on independent filmmakers.
- Aside from being filmed largely by blacklisted filmmakers, it used real locations and non-actors along with a professional cast and crew, to the point where the film often feels like a documentary with its structure and incredible cinematography.
- Despite the acting not always being the best, the actors really try to put in some earnest performances in their roles that you can't help but praise.
- The filming managed to be completed despite the arrest of lead actress Rosaura Revueltas and threats from local mobs, among loads of additional problems. That takes serious persistence and dedication considering all of the odds stacked against the workers.
- The result of these turns of events, plus the approval of local residents, would be a story that not only recounts major incidents in the strike, but also focused on two major themes: discrimination against minority workers and discrimination against women, which is where film's impact was most felt in its focus. The former was not unexpected, but the feminist aspect was more surprising: The women are opposed by both their gender and their race, meaning they have to deal with two different forms of opposition. Both of those themes hold up incredibly well and manage to tragically remain relevant even all these decades later.
- There's nothing surprising about a community of Mexican American workers standing in solidarity against an exploitative mining company, or workers in the film grabbing a bit of justice for themselves.
- Esperanza Quintero, her miner husband Ramon Quintero, and the various women leaders of the strike manage to be tragic and sympathetic, yet compelling characters within the narrative.
- Ramon in particular goes through decent character development: He starts off as a misogynist who would overlook and underestimate his wife's work and duties. Over the course of the film, he'd realize the error of his sexism, and it’s not out of some spontaneous revelation or appeal to an abstract standard of morality and justice, but rather a position that has formed slowly and organically over the course of the film through experience and discussion.
- It proves that forms of dramatic art that don't center obsessively on an isolated individual aren't always false and/or sentimental by default. Even On the Waterfront, released that same year as Best Picture Winner, managed to be more sentimental than this film.
Bad Qualities
- While this is definitely not the film's fault, as it was created and released in the mid-50s, despite the film's themes managing to hold up incredibly well, the pacing can be very slow-paced a lot of the time, and the concept probably won't appeal to mainstream moviegoers.
- Although this might be intentional for the message to kick in, the management representative George Hartwell is little more than a stereotypical capitalist, and a pretty boring and one-note antagonist. Likewise, the film's other antagonists -- the sheriff, the foreman, and the company president -- are all cardboard villains as well.
The Film
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