Bread and Roses (2000)

SERIOUSLY. This is what the crap Hollywood still puts out?

Dreadfully Boring

The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

surprised that this movie got an overall 7.1 score. I think it deserves much higher than that. I think part of the reason could be this movie is heavily political and sympathetic to the problems that most illegal immigrants are facing in real life. However, it is also a fact that the problems portrayed in this movie is universal for all workers who do not have a union. The script is very nicely written, except in one occasion when Maya stole money from the service station. I thought that it was unnecessary to include this episode in the script; it diluted the seriousness of the film; she could have easily asked Sam to loan the small amount of money that Maya needed in order to give it to Ruben.Acting by Pilar Padilla (Maya), Adrien Brody (Sam), and Elpidia Carrillo (Rosa) are outstanding!

I am a member of United Food & Commercial Workers. The first time I saw this movie was August 23, 2004 at a youth conference. This is one of the best union movies I have seen. I was in Montreal this summer at a convention and we all sang the song as well. The movie is very moving and gives a very powerful perspective on what happens at some strikes and also what happens when workers find out you are trying to organize the workplace. Organizing is when you try and get the workplace unionized. As a female, I am truly amazed at the fight these women put up with to become unionized. I personally have been touched by Bread & Roses and I know many fellow union members who have been as well.

Ken Loach has made outstanding, impassioned films about the British working class for decades, but some of his more recent material has felt a bit lacking in variety. His decision to make a film set in Los Angeles was undoubtedly a good one, especially as, in 'Bread and Roses', he tells of a side to that city (its immigrant underclass) usually unrepresented by the Hollywood moguls. What's best about this film is the realistic insight it provides into the lives of its characters, and knowing that it is based on a true story only increases one's interest in how it will turn out, and one's political anger at the gross injustices in our societies. The two-faced attitudes that affluent countries have towards migrant labour are also directly exposed. What's slightly less strong is the film's narrative arc (judged purely as fiction); everything ends quite suddenly, and, surprisingly for a work by Loach, optimistically as well. Nonetheless, Loach has seen things that many who live in L.A. chose to overlook; and the film constitutes a distinctive entry in his distinguished canon.

Ken Loach's one-dimensional liberal stance spoils this otherwise entertaining film about an illegal Mexican immigrant, Maya,who finds a job as a cleaner in an anonymous downtown LA skyscraper where her American-based sister, Rosa, already works. The film follows fiery Rosa's plight as an underpaid cleaner, her various conflicts with her sister and her eventual political awakening via the intervention of Adrien Brody's character, Sam Shapiro, a subversive Union representative. The film is a fictional reinterpretation of real life events involving the Justice for Janitors campaign against low pay for cleaners. Despite the human dramas that unfold during the film, Bread and Roses is a thinly-veiled attack on American economical injustice, especially against illegal immigrant workers. Oddly enough, Loach does not balance his Anti-American views against the lack of opportunities and poverty in Mexico. He never considers why Maya has left Mexico. Yes, she wanted to be with her sister - but was this the only reason? it's very easy to take pot shots at North America, but when it's this simplistic, one must question Mr Loach's lack of subtlety as a filmmaker. Overall, Bread and Roses works best as a human drama rather than a political one.