Movie review - Made in Dagenham

It's 1968 and Britain is going through a period of economic prosperity, thanks in part to their manufacturing industry - such as the Dagenham Ford Motors plant, as explained in the prologue. This was helped by the employment of female workers - despite having to sew together the leather pieces for seats and door interiors by hand, their classification is downgraded to 'unskilled' and they are paid a fraction of their male counterparts' wages. Made in Dagenham is based on the worker's strike against sexual discrimination and the opposition they faced not only from the company, but also the government and even their partners at home. 


MID is follows a pretty standard underdog formula and the question of workers rights and discrimination are treated fairly lightly but hindsight makes me think that this was actually quite a well written and paced story. It's not interesting watching the people on strike day to day, just as sitting in on hours of political negotiation doesn't make for rivetting TV either (some politicians are duly excluded from this generalisation - seriously, watch this video). Although occasionally formulaic in terms of characters e.g. Sally Hawkins as the initially unassuming Rita O'Grady who is thrust into fame as the strike leader who comes to realise that to be treated fairly is a right and not a privilege, the male union leader (Kenneth Cranham) is a misogynist looking to feather his nest, imperiously fiery redhead Miranda Richardson as MP Barbara Castle who comes up against Rita, and Rosamund Pike as the (ridiculously) good-looking Ford manger's wife, Lisa, who strikes up a (not quite believeable) friendship with Rita, this simplification actually makes the movie somewhat energetic because it's not laden down with too much detail.  

That's not to say that the movie is all fluff. MID makes quite clear at various points that there are multiple issues here. There is of course gender discrimination, but interestingly the effect of political pressure by multinational companies, and also one of class. The strikers are all of course from the 'Working Class', as seen by their accents, clothing, houses etc., and at various points they are viewed with a level of condescension by others, but it is shown that while the class hierarchy is alive and well, women rated at the bottom of heap, as seen by Lisa who took a first at Oxford but whose opinions are disregarded, and even Barbara Castle's staffers (who reminded me of Mother's sons from Futurama) attempt to tell her how it's done. 


I'll admit that this doesn't seem like the kind of movie I'd see. While I was in Rundon, there was a full-scale advertising campaign...from which I wasn't really able to extrapolate what the movie was really about. The bright colours, smiling faces, and fun font refers nothing to the plot other than placing a time frame and I suppose the title. But Suboo got some free tickets and after watching this, I think I can highly recommend this! 

What a change compared to the last 3 movies! 
8/10