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"HardLuck County, USA", I remembered this film winning the Oscar for Best Ducumentary back in the 1970's. I remember really wanting to see it but, especially back then, it was pretty hard to come across documentaries on TV (forget about movie theaters). Thus it was with great pleasure that I noticed it on the April schedule of the Independent Film Channel. My politics have changed over the years so I haven't rushed out to join a union or volunteer to parade in a pickett line after watching "Harlan County, USA". However, I was fascinated with the up-close and personal film that told a very compelling story. The glimpses of the mines, the miners in their squalid homes, the anger and determination, the tedium and the violence all brought together the sort of documentary that underlines the adage "Truth is Stranger than Fiction".

This film excels by bringing the story to life through the people that live it. There are a number of men and women who seem to take the lead and a number of men and women who tell the story of what happened a couple of generations earlier. There are side stories about Black Lung disease and the Yablonski murders (that I remember well). There is a sort of epilogue that suggests a mixed future for the mine workers.

I read a couple of reviews by indiviuals who said that they were from the area and could attest first-hand to the short-comings of the documentary. I couldn't help but notice a telling scene or two where the strike-breakers were armed with guns and the strikers were armed with clubs. I also noticed that there were at least a couple of scenes where the union leaders were advocating calm and reason in the wake of violence by the strike-breakers. I knew better than to take this at face value and I appreciated those reviews that confirmed that there was violence on both sides. The issue of unionizing and striking are not simple ones especially in a society that celebrates individuality. The strike-breakers were portrayed as evil which is very debatable (and there was no look at the strike-breakers view by the makers of "Harlan County, USA"). They had families to feed as well. I would grant them that they chose to continue on in order to take care of those they were responsible for. I know of plenty of tales in other parts of the country where violence was more prevalent on the union side than the other and the lack of seeing any other point of view just confirms my suspicions of the bias in this film. That said, I came away from the movie with the sense that neither side was faring very well in the conditions they worked in. It was illuminating to finally see the story that I followed in the newspapers back then.

"Very well done Doc", This is one of the best done documentiers I have seen in some time, it gets to the hart of the ppl right off the start and keeps the viewer in pace with the situation and the times.

Highly recommended for personal or education use.

"Where are people of this courage today?", When I saw this documentary it confirmed what Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States 1492 - the Present" talked about regarding the hard fought victories of early unionism in America. I was grabbed by the throat emotionally by this documentary and its grip did not stop with the end of the film. Union members literally get beaten, shot, disrespected, and dismissed by the mine owners and their goon squads.

What impresses me most is the courage of these miners, their wives and families. With union membership in America down to 9% it makes me wonder where are those who will fight for a decent living wage, health care, a safe and healthy environment, and a future for their children. These coal miners set an example for everyone who seeks a more just society. Their solidarity is remarkable under any circumstances, but especially so where law enforcement was owned by the coal company.

The coal miners of Harlan County are the kind of activist citizens who make me proud to be an American. I just hope a follow up documentary will be done to see what the situation is there now.



"Harlan County, U.S.A", I was born in Harlan County but escaped to spend a career in the US Air Force. When this strike happened I was overseas and the event escaped my notice until just now. I do remember the absolute poverty of the coal camps but they were no worse than lumber camps or the homes of many who worked for neither. During my youth the third most profitable industry was moonshine, now its pot. My Dad owned a small independent mine for a period but was forced out of business by union miners who threatened his leased truckers to the point that they refused to transport his coal over Pine Mountain to the railroad. Life has not progressed in Harlan County today as it has in other parts of the US; in fact, during my last visit I thought that it was worse than when I was a child helping Dad at his mine (early 1950s.) However, I still was moved by this film as much as I have ever beeen moved by a movie. Well worth watching!

"Interesting Documentary", I grew up in a county bordering Harlan County. As coal company employees my father and uncle both experienced the strikes of the seventies, and the associated violence, so this documentary appealed to me for those reasons. Despite what appears to me to unfortunately be socialist or "progressive" undertones, Kopple does a good job of depicting the life of the eastern Kentucky coal miner in the early seventies. Although the UMWA has outlived its usefulness, the documentary illustrates why it was necessary at one time.

One minor quibble on my part: anyone who grew up or lives in eastern Kentucky knows the sterling reputation of the Kentucky State Police, and their absolute refusal to take sides in a strike, only getting involved for the purpose of keeping roads open and preventing violence. The incorrect portrayal of them as biased against the strikers is limited, and only a slight distraction.

The commentary by the crew some 20 years after filming gives us an interesting view from their perspective as "big city outsiders" who were fortunate enough to find mountain folks willing to share their lives and homes with them. Surviving in the seventies a place those of us in the area called "bloody Harlan" was also a laudable accomplishment, again considering that the crew was made up of outsiders.

Overall a very good documentary that I would recommend to anyone who is interested in the Kentucky coal strikes of the seventies.

Read this reviews before You buy...

"Wow!!!", Possibly the most powerful documentary ever! Never could I imagine in the U.S.A., the most developed country in the world, i'd see people working or living in the same conditions as these people were in Harlan county. What impressed me the most was how strong the strike workers' wives were to join their husbands at the picket line. The scene were they defiantly blocked the road with their vehicles and refused to allow the scabs/picket crossers to pass, especially with guns drawn at them brought tears to my eyes. Two thumbs up! A+++

"scab hater", william caputo sounds like the kinda feller that steals dead flys from blind spiders when he is not busy stealing food from honest hard working people or proclaiming the virtues of scumba... i mean scabs.

"Life or Death, KY", Contrary to what the prior reviewer said this documentary is one of the best documentations of working class struggle in the United States. What this film portrays is the inner workings of the way workers and their families become conscious and weary of exploitive practices of the company, and the epiphanies that occur in order to overcome these malpractices. In that function this film is a masterpiece, it won an oscar rightly so because its impact on the viewer is so earth shattering.

The movie begins by showing the absolute impoverished lives of the mine workers who are virtually in feudal bondage to company tenement housing with no paved roads,running water, or electricity. Through a series of betrayals both from the company,the working class(scabs), AND THE UNION, the workers experience many cathartic moments in their campaign for material relief,rights and dignity. Some of these epiphanies are difficult to understand if you're not coming from the perspective of a highly impoverished industrial laborer, and include the rationalization of violence in defense of maintaining the strike and defying the declarations of the union.

Yes this is a biased documentary, the very concept of a documentary chooses to leave the comfort of neutrality and take a position, to choose a subject as a protagonist against an antagonist. You would find yourself very bored if you had to watch a two hour movie about how 'objectively everyone is right in their view, all we can do is observe and hope we just all get along', that's just NOT how the world works. Imagine trying to watch a movie about the Auschwitz rationalized on both sides, history would occur on film as it did in nazi germany, as a necessary process for the 'Vaterland', a crime to ignore for the sake the the majority. Now fortunately documentaries take the side of the oppressed prisoners most of the time, and we can see through this subjective view how insidious and evil these crimes were*. If we put this in perspective, a film that objectively just interviewed, got the rational view points and had some omnipotent view of the miners strike would in-fact only reinforce the reality as it occurred then,'it's unfortunate that all these accidents occur in the mines but the country needs coal more than you need you lungs,your family, or your life. Therefore, in the name of progress scabs will work your job and hopefully these inconvenient battles can stop, hope you understand you de-evolved luddite bum!'. Of course, this reality is a basic untruth and it was forcefully destroyed by the collective action of the UMWA vis-a-vis an enormous internal pitched revolt in the rank-and-file and the creation of this movie.

If you are totally sympathetic to scabs and exploitive managers, this movie will just upset you and make you feel hatred or indifference. If you want to see a documentary about how scabs are just trying to make living and companies provide ample amount of services or money to their workers watch the news, but if the contradiction of working people turning on each other perplexes you,that the only formal institutions the working class has to defend it are paradoxically controlled by company men, this documentary will show you the only means the impoverished have to combat it:their solidarity,their bodies,sticks, and stones.

(*note: It is because of the action of the allies that this reality and untruth were defeated that a documentary can expose the concetration detainees plight)

"Extremely Biased Film Portrays Strikers As "Angels"", I love how this movie portrays the striking coal miners and their wives as innocent angels while the scabs are called "gun thugs" who just open fire on innocently peaceful protesters with machine guns.

The film-maker spends 99% of the film with the strikers and doesn't try too hard to get the opinions of the scabs and mining company workers.

After all, scabs are people who do the work that the miners do not want to do themselves. The work has to be done anyway.

The mining company in this film not only gave its employees wages but also housed all of them too. Of course the wages and housing conditions are lousy but HOUSING EMPLOYEES IS NOT AN EMPLOYER'S JOB!

Any sane person (or anyone who has seen a major strike in person) finds it hard to believe that the scabs are the sole instigators during strikes and that the strikers are the pure victims. Scabs are just trying to go to work and support their families too but are violently harassed by strikers who can do the same work but choose not to. If the work is good enough for the scabs, then why isn't it good enough for the strikers?

Strikers also use more than just words to taunt scabs. They use sticks, clubs and occasionally guns or knives to hurt scabs whom they believe are taking their jobs away from them. In this film, when the scabs defend themselves for the right to go into work without getting hurt or killed by the hot-tempered strikers, it is the scabs who are always portrayed as the "gun thugs" and "evil" while the strikers are always seen being saint-like, perfectly behaved and unjustly discriminated against.

Why else are police officers on the scene of most major strikes? To protect the strikers? Hell no. They are there to protect the scabs who are trying to go into work but are subjected to constant harassment by the strikers.

This film even has the token black striker, who happens to get along with all of the white striker folks. But guess who uses the "n-word" in this movie toward a black person? You guessed it...an evil scab.

I wonder if this film would have shown the strikers' reaction to a black scab if there was one. Probably not.

Bottom line: If you are pro-union and believe scabs are the scum of the Earth and that strikers can do no wrong, then "Harlan County, U.S.A." is the movie for you.



"An excellent documentary", This review is for the Criterion Collection DVD edition of the film.

Harlan County U.S.A. is a documentary about a coal miner's strike in Harlan County in Southeast Kentucky. The film documents the cause of the strike and its resolution.

I was apalled at the depolorabe housing conditions of the miners and their families. They were living in shacks with no running water or electricity. The strikebreakers also had violent encounters with the striking miners.

The filmmakers interviews various people and document the history of coal mining in the United States. I learned a bit too and really enjoyed the film. The movie has an original soundtrack with amateur singers performing songs they have written.

The DVD includes a theatrical trailer, audio commentary by director Kopple and editor Nancy Baker, a documentary on the making of the film, with interviews with the filmmmakers and strikers, outtakes, an interview with bluegrass singer Hazel Dickens, an interview with John Sayles, and a discussion of the film featuring Roger Ebert at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival.

This is one of better documentaries I've seen on the subject of the workplace and I highly recommend it.