THE FILM

Carmen works the graveyard shift in one of Tijuana's maquiladoras, the
multinationally-owned factories that came to Mexico for its cheap labor.
After making television components all night, Carmen comes home to a
shack she built out of recycled garage doors, in a neighborhood with no
sewage lines or electricity.  She suffers from kidney damage and lead
poisoning from her years of exposure to toxic chemicals.  She earns six
dollars a day.  But Carmen is not a victim.  She is a dynamic young
woman, busy making a life for herself and her children. 

As Carmen and a million other maquiladora workers produce televisions,
electrical cables, toys, clothes, batteries and IV tubes, they weave the
very fabric of life for consumer nations.  They also confront labor
violations, environmental devastation and urban chaos -- life on the
frontier of the global economy.  In MAQUILAPOLIS, Carmen and her
colleague Lourdes reach beyond the daily struggle for survival to
organize for change:  Carmen takes a major television manufacturer to
task for violating her labor rights.  Lourdes pressures the government
to clean up a toxic waste dump left behind by a departing factory.

As they work for change, the world changes too:  a global economic
crisis and the availability of cheaper labor in China begin to pull the
factories away from Tijuana, leaving Carmen, Lourdes and their
colleagues with an uncertain future. 

THE PROCESS

To create MAQUILAPOLIS, the filmmakers brought together factory workers
in Tijuana and community organizations in Mexico and the U.S. to
collaborate on a film that depicts globalization through the eyes of the
women who live on its leading edge.  The factory workers who appear in
the film have been involved in every stage of production, from planning
to shooting, from scripting to outreach.  This collaborative process
breaks with the traditional documentary practice of dropping into a
location, shooting and leaving with the "goods," which would only repeat
the pattern of the maquiladora itself.  The process embraces
subjectivity as a value and a goal.  It merges  artmaking with community
development to ensure that the film's voice will be truly that of its
subjects.   

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This film is part of the Communities Connecting for Change : A  Social
justice Project which is a collaboration between the College of
Charleston and a steering committee of community leaders to build and
foster community awareness and partnerships for social change in the
Lowcountry. Thematic community events are scheduled from September 2007
to March 2008 when the project will culminate in a 2-day
alliance-building conference.  For more infomation, please visit:   
http://www.cofc.edu/~diversity