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MATEWAN Film Screening

matewan west virginia coal mining film screening

*Disclaimer: This film is rated PG-13 for mature audiences due to subject matter.*
Watch the 1987 film based on the 1920 Matewan, WV coal miners’ union strike and the events that followed. Starring Chris Cooper and James Earl Jones. Shown in remastered color!

"Matewan, West Virginia, 1920. Coal miners, struggling to form a union, are up against company operators and the gun thugs of the notorious Baldwin-Felts detective agency. Black and Italian miners, brought in by the company to break the strike, are caught between the two forces. UMWA organizer and dual-card Wobbly Joe Kenehan determines to bring the local, Black, and Italian groups together. While Kenehan and his story are fictional, the setting and the dramatic climax are historical; Sid Hatfield, Cabell C. Testerman, C. E. Lively and the Felts brothers were real-life participants, and 'Few Clothes' is based on a character active several years previously"

View the movie trailer here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCIoiHf_Lt4