Salt of the Earth

Salt of the Earth is simply one of the greatest achievements in American cinema, not because it is exemplary in those aspects which usually make a film great, but because it excels in its ideals where so many others during the period were failing. The plot is deceptively simple. Mexican American men, along with a few whites ("Anglos" in the Mexicans' parlance), decide that their job in the mine is too dangerous and that they are treated unfairly compared to Anglo workers. They strike, putting their families through terrible hardships. While this film certainly has an agenda, it thankfully becomes more complex than just a Labor vs Management dispute. Perhaps an even more important theme is the relationship between the men and their women, wives, mothers, sisters. At one point, the Taft-Hartley Act is enacted (of course I mention the name because of recent events), and the miners can no longer picket legally. Their wives, who are asked, according to the local mores, to be silent, dare to pick up the duties of the strike. Not only is Salt of the Earth a brave champion of the worker and minorities, it has the audacity (in 1954!) to back women's rights. No wonder this was the only American film to be blacklisted.