Made in Bangladesh

RUBAIYAT HOSSAIN
Bangladesh, France, Denmark, Portugal, 2019
95 minutes, Color
Official website

In the busy metropolis of Dhaka, Shimu supports her unemployed husband with a job as a seamstress in a garment factory. Shaken by the casual lack of accountability management shows after a fire kills a colleague, Shimu connects with local feminist organizer Apa, who informs her of her rights to unionize. Under the deafening din of hundreds of manually operated sewing machines, a quiet revolution begins to build. Eschewing a celebratory female empowerment narrative, Rubaiyat Hossain's writing weighs patient acts of administration equally with the alliances across social class and more dramatic acts of courage that encompass the labor of activism. The result is a nuanced and quietly rousing portrait of the pleasures, possibilities, and limitations of collective liberation and feminist solidarity.—BFI London Film Festival

In English and Bengali with English subtitles