Man måste ju leva...

Filmed in the coal country of West Virginia, "Matewan" celebrates labor organizing in the context of a 1920s work stoppage. Union organizer, Joe Kenehan, a scab named "Few Clothes" Johnson and a sympathetic mayor and police chief heroically fight the power represented by a coal company and Matewan's vested interests so that justice and workers' rights need not take a back seat to squalid working conditions, exploitation and the bottom line.

In a company trading maté, workers are treated as slaves. Some of them try to escape, but those who are caught suffer severe punishments.

25-year-old philosophy major Marta faces the ugly truth for many young Italians — a complete lack of career opportunities. While babysitting for single mother Sonia, she starts to work as a telemarketer, quickly rising through the ranks of the company, but experiencing first-hand the fanatical and exploitative rat-race culture pushed on employees. Around her revolve people like delusional supervisor Daniela, her boss Claudio, fragile coworker Lucio, and well-meaning but inconsistent union rep Giorgio.

The eldest member of a rural community of grape growers refuses to sell his land to a greedy real estate company. When he seems cornered by the dirty tactics of a corrupt businessman, he must decide whether to give up everything he owns, or take control of the situation.

The life of the cotton workers in the Chaco and its struggle for wages.

Portugal, 1944. In a country oppressed by a brutal dictatorship, there are those who resist and mobilize the people to fight for bread and freedom, even if it cost them prison, torture or their lives.

During 2004 alone, 1400 people in Italy died at their workplace, 3.87 per day. Andrea is one of them.

Emma Freese is desperate when her husband Alfred falls ill at the Howaldtswerke in Kiel. How is the family supposed to get by without their wages? The war has scarred this generation, but now things are supposed to be looking up. The workers want their fair share and are fighting for an income that also gives them room to live. In October 1956, 34,000 metalworkers in the shipyards and factories of Schleswig-Holstein walk off the job to fight for justice and their dignity. This strike is still regarded as the toughest and longest in Germany. Employers and politicians stand in the strikers' way.

A young man receiving medical treatment in the hospital reminisces about fishing in the small dory his grandfather owned.

Six widows demand compensation for the death of their husbands, who were killed during a worker's strike. The women are arrested and taken to the police quarters, where the authorities try to make them retract their statements, but it turns out they're not so easily intimidated.

For 200 years, coal mining had been a way of life in Cape Breton. By 1920 things were looking up: miners were unionized and paid decent wages. Then the British Empire Steel Corporation arrived and bought every single steel and coal company in Nova Scotia. BESCO cut wages by a third, setting off a bitter labour dispute. The miners settled in for a long strike. Finally, in 1925, the military ended the unrest with brute force. But the miners, in one sense, had won. They broke up the monopoly and provided an example to workers across the country.