El Contrato (2003)

Directed by

Min Sook Lee

Genre

documentary

Country

Canada

Runtime

51 min

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

This documentary exposes the harsh living and working conditions of Mexican migrant farm laborers in Ontario, Canada. It follows their struggle for basic rights and dignity under exploitative contracts.

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What happens

El Contrato (lit. "The Contract") is a Canadian documentary film, directed by Min Sook Lee and released in 2003. The film portrays the harsh living conditions of exploited migrant workers from Mexico who are working as farm labourers in Leamington, Ontario. The film premiered at the Bloor Cinema on September 24, 2003, but the farmers depicted in the film issued a SLAPP suit which delayed the film's wider release. After the lawsuit was cleared, the film received further film festival screenings in 2004, before being broadcast by TVOntario on January 12, 2005. Lee subsequently returned to the theme of migrant workers in her 2016 film Migrant Dreams, which centred on similar exploitation of Indonesian temporary migrant workers. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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