American Dream (1990) is a cinéma vérité documentary film directed by Barbara Kopple and co-directed by Cathy Caplan, Thomas Haneke, and Lawrence Silk.
The film recounts an unsuccessful strike in the heartland of America against the Hormel Foods corporation.
The film is centered on unionized meatpacking workers at Hormel Foods in Austin, Minnesota between 1985 and 1986. Hormel had cut the hourly wage from $10.69 to $8.25 and cut benefits by 30 percent despite posting a net profit of $30 million. The local union (P-9) opposed the cut, but the national union, the United Food and Commercial Workers, disagrees with their strategy.
The local union is shown hiring a freelance strike consultant, Ray Rogers, who comes in with charts, graphs and promises of a corporate campaign to draw national press attention. Rogers delivers in the short term, but, it is not enough to defeat opposition from Hormel management and the UFCW international union.
Soon, despite the efforts of a seasoned negotiator sent by the parent union, the company has locked out the workers and hired replacement workers, leading to a series of violent conflicts amongst members of the community. The workers' resolve progressively fades as the battle extends into months and years, and the financial hardships they and their families suffer leads some to doubt the value of their efforts. Kopple, who had previously covered an extended miner's strike in the acclaimed 1977 documentary Harlan County, USA, focuses on the personalities and emotions behind the strike, creating a highly charged portrait of labor that is sympathetic to the workers' distress without ignoring the strike's greater ambiguities.
Written by John Mellencamp
I had a face so cute made a young girl cry
And I could blow 'em away with just a wink of my eye
I got all dolled up on a Saturday night
Can't find a lady so I'll start a fight
Hey but ain't that the American Dream
But at School the young boys would assemble down in the parking lot
And we spoke of the homecoming queen and all the goodies she's got
Well those stories would choke a semi
And every dare was do or die
Hey but ain't that the American Dream
(bridge)
Well I grew up believin' I could do what I wanted to do
When I got a little older I found that it just wasn't true
There's gotta be a place for me
Where I can out-be just what I want to be
Hey but ain't that the American Dream
Some of the girls are out teaching high school biology
And all of my boyfriends they work down at Cummmins factory
But me I'm still out on the streets trying to locate some destiny
Hey but ain't that the American Dream
(repeat bridge)