The Dryden will screen The Killing Floor (Bill Duke, U.S. 1985, 118 min., DCP) followed by a Discussion with Demond Meeks, Shelly D. Clements, and Carvin Eison as part of the Labor Film Series.

The film that inspired creation of the Rochester Labor Film Series in 1989, The Killing Floor recounts the true story of efforts to organize an interracial union of Chicago packing house workers during and after World War I. The film explores the tensions between southern black workers lured north by high wartime wages and the ethnic European workers they replace, culminating in the 1919 Chicago race riots. The film won a Special Jury Prize at the 1985 Sundance Film Festival and was selected by the Zinn Education Project as a resource for "Teaching People's History."

[source: George Eastman Museum website, 2019-Oct-7]