Workingman's Death
Encyclopedia
Workingman's Death is a 2005
Austrian-German documentary film
written and directed by Michael Glawogger
. It premiered at the 2005 Venice Film Festival
. The film deals with the extremes to which workers go to earn a living in several countries around the world.
The film is composed of six differently titled chapters. The first five depict hazardous conditions of hard laborers around the world and the sixth shows contrasting scenes of youths in a former German industrial complex which had been converted into a leisure park:
as of March 2011, with several critics praising its visual feel. Walter Addiego of the San Francisco Chronicle
wrote that "Despite the hardships depicted, many sequences have a dreamlike beauty. In addition, the director has a bone-dry sense of irony; during the Ukraine scenes, he frequently cuts away to a statue of Stakhanov, the "hero" lauded by the Soviets for his superhuman work habits".
Film critic Nathan Rabin
, writing for The A.V. Club
, said that "Glawogger is an extraordinarily elegant filmmaker with a photographer's eye for striking compositions. He seems to have selected the jobs documented here as much for their telegenic qualities as their all-around awfulness, and he excels at divining moments of pure cinema and haunting beauty out of the most perilous places and professions on Earth".
The Village Voice
s Michael Atkinson
wrote that "Glawogger's film may be thematically loose-jointed, but Wolfgang Thaler's cinematography is the glue; the signature move—a flowing Steadicam
track before or following a subject—blooms into variations on a visceral theme, especially as it rhymes the Nigerian butchers stalking through acres of red mud dragging bull heads with the Indonesians carrying rocks down smoking, tourist-littered mountain paths".
2005 in film
- Highest-grossing films :Please note that following the tradition of the English-language film industry, these are the top-grossing films that were first released in the United States in 2005...
Austrian-German documentary film
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
written and directed by Michael Glawogger
Michael Glawogger
Michael Glawogger is an Austrian film director, screenwriter and cinematographer.From 1981 to 1982 Glawogger studied at the San Francisco Art Institute and then from 1983 to 1989 at the Vienna Film Academy...
. It premiered at the 2005 Venice Film Festival
Venice Film Festival
The Venice International Film Festival is the oldest international film festival in the world. Founded by Count Giuseppe Volpi in 1932 as the "Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica", the festival has since taken place every year in late August or early September on the island of the...
. The film deals with the extremes to which workers go to earn a living in several countries around the world.
The film is composed of six differently titled chapters. The first five depict hazardous conditions of hard laborers around the world and the sixth shows contrasting scenes of youths in a former German industrial complex which had been converted into a leisure park:
- Heroes – Miners of Donets BasinDonets BasinDonbas or Donbass , full rarely-used name Donets Basin , is a historical, economic and cultural region of eastern Ukraine. Originally a coal mining area, it has become a heavily industrialised territory suffering from urban decay and industrial pollution.-Geography:Donbas covers three...
, UkraineUkraineUkraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia... - Ghosts – Sulfur carriers in IjenIjenThe Ijen volcano complex is a group of stratovolcanoes, in East Java, Indonesia. It is inside a larger caldera Ijen, which is about 20 kilometers wide. The Gunung Merapi stratovolcano is the highest point of that complex. The name of this volcano resembles that of a different volcano, Mount...
, IndonesiaIndonesiaIndonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an... - Lions – Butchers in an open-air market in Port Harcourt, NigeriaNigeriaNigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...
- Brothers – Welders in the Gadani ship-breaking yard in PakistanPakistanPakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
- The Future - Steel workers in LiaoningLiaoning' is a province of the People's Republic of China, located in the northeast of the country. Its one-character abbreviation is "辽" , a name taken from the Liao River that flows through the province. "Níng" means "peace"...
, ChinaPeople's Republic of ChinaChina , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres... - Epilogue – Youths in Landschaftspark Duisburg-NordLandschaftspark Duisburg-NordLandschaftspark is a public park located in Duisburg Nord, Germany.It was designed in 1991 by Latz + Partner , with the intention that it work to heal and understand the industrial past, rather than trying to reject it...
in GermanyGermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
Reception
The film was met with a largely positive critical reception with a 73% approval rating reported by Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
as of March 2011, with several critics praising its visual feel. Walter Addiego of the San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
wrote that "Despite the hardships depicted, many sequences have a dreamlike beauty. In addition, the director has a bone-dry sense of irony; during the Ukraine scenes, he frequently cuts away to a statue of Stakhanov, the "hero" lauded by the Soviets for his superhuman work habits".
Film critic Nathan Rabin
Nathan Rabin
Nathan Rabin is an American film and music critic. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, Rabin was the first head writer for The A.V. Club, a position he continues to hold today....
, writing for The A.V. Club
The A.V. Club
The A.V. Club is an entertainment newspaper and website published by The Onion. Its features include reviews of new films, music, television, books, games and DVDs, as well as interviews and other regular offerings examining both new and classic media and other elements of pop culture. Unlike its...
, said that "Glawogger is an extraordinarily elegant filmmaker with a photographer's eye for striking compositions. He seems to have selected the jobs documented here as much for their telegenic qualities as their all-around awfulness, and he excels at divining moments of pure cinema and haunting beauty out of the most perilous places and professions on Earth".
The Village Voice
The Village Voice
The Village Voice is a free weekly newspaper and news and features website in New York City that features investigative articles, analysis of current affairs and culture, arts and music coverage, and events listings for New York City...
s Michael Atkinson
Michael Atkinson (writer)
Michael Atkinson is an American writer, poet and film critic. His debut novel is Hemingway Deadlights , and he has written film and culture critiques for The Believer, Sight & Sound, The Guardian, Film Comment, The Village Voice, In These Times, True/Slant, SPiN, Maxim, The Boston Phoenix,...
wrote that "Glawogger's film may be thematically loose-jointed, but Wolfgang Thaler's cinematography is the glue; the signature move—a flowing Steadicam
Steadicam
A Steadicam is a stabilizing mount for a motion picture camera that mechanically isolates it from the operator's movement, allowing a smooth shot even when moving quickly over an uneven surface...
track before or following a subject—blooms into variations on a visceral theme, especially as it rhymes the Nigerian butchers stalking through acres of red mud dragging bull heads with the Indonesians carrying rocks down smoking, tourist-littered mountain paths".
| Awarding Body | Award | Nominee | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Directors Guild of America Directors Guild of America Directors Guild of America is an entertainment labor union which represents the interests of film and television directors in the United States motion picture industry... |
Best Director - Documentary Feature | Michael Glawogger | |
| European Film Awards | Best Documentary | Michael Glawogger | |
| German Film Awards | Best Documentary | Pepe Danquart Erich Lackner Mirjam Quinte |
|
| Gijón Film Festival Gijón International Film Festival Gijón International Film Festival was created in 1963. It was born as an initiative of the local authority and it was sponsored mainly by Gijón City Council and the then Caja de Ahorros de Asturias ; both institutions are still the main organisers of the festival, along with funding from the... |
Special Jury Award | ||
| Leipzig DOK Festival International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film The International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film , also known as the Leipzig DOK Festival, is a film festival that takes place annually in Leipzig, Germany. It was founded in 1955 under the name "1st All-German Leipzig Festival of Cultural and Documentary Films" and was the... |
FIPRESCI Prize | ||
| London Film Festival | Grierson Award | Michael Glawogger | |
| Yerevan Festival Yerevan International Film Festival Yerevan International Film Festival "Golden Apricot" is a Yerevan-based annual film festival. The objectives of the festival are "to present new works by the film directors and producers in Armenia and foreign cinematographers of Armenian descent and to promote creativity and originality in the... |
Golden Apricot for Best Documentary | ||
External links
- Official website
- Workingman's Death at MetacriticMetacriticMetacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...