North Country

For the first time, I went to see a movie by myself last night. That was a big step in itself. I felt pretty strongly that I wanted to see this movie regardless of whether anyone was available to see it with me.

I'm not going to write a review, but...North Country, starring Charlize Theron and the legendary Frances McDormand, is the (inspired by a true) story of women working in a Minnesota mine, sexually harrassed, even attacked, by their male co-workers on a daily basis. Only one of these women is willing to speak out, despite attempts by people at every level of the company to step on her. She eventually pulls enough people together to file a class action lawsuit against the company, which sets a precendent for legislation of sexual equality in the workplace everywhere.

What scares me is that this did not happen very long ago. The lawsuit was won only in 1998, 10 years after it was filed and 23 years after the abuse began. Right up until the end the mining company (Eveleth Mines, in real life) was fighting the lawsuit, labelling the women as either "nuts or sluts". This makes me angry, but that is the main objective of the movie. In the end I was left with great respect for what this woman achieved, although there is still a long way to go before gender equality is truly reached...

I think back to my undergraduate days working in a grocery store for an Italian family, propositioned frequently by the boss' son and married brother-in-law, and slightly ostracised for telling them to piss off, as the boss and the other girls pretended not to notice. I wonder why I stayed there for 3 years, and put it down to needing money to get through university and there being very few other casual jobs available, but also knowing that I was better than that. And when I try to understand why they picked on me, I think it was because I was a university student with a lot more than a career in a grocery store ahead of me.

Anyway, I'm heading out now to buy the book.