The event is scheduled as part of the centenary of the Douarnenez factory workers’ strike, however, it is indeed today’s workers who are the subject of the documentary “Demain au travail”, which will be screened in preview Wednesday January 8 at Le Club cinema, in Douarnenez. Directed by Douarne documentary filmmaker Liza Le Tonquer, this 52-minute film offers a fascinating insight into the daily life of a few workers at the Chancerelle factory.
Between 15 and 20 testimonials
“I started working on this film at the beginning of 2024, after being contacted by Paris-Brest Productions. Gurvan Hue, Chloé Dubset and I went to shoot the first images in March. It was really difficult to shoot a 52-minute film in such a short time,” explains Liza Le Tonquer, who set up her camera in the sardine factory of the Douarneniste cannery, and in other places where the employees of the The factory were kind enough to testify. “I collected between 15 and 20 testimonies from workers. Not all of them appear in the documentary,” specifies the director.
Without Manichaeism, Liza Le Tonquer shows what work in the factory consists of today, and the feeling that workers have towards their profession and the company. Some of them thus describe a form of recognition, not to say gratitude, towards the company for having hired them and thus participated in their emancipation. This is particularly the case for employees of foreign origin, a legion within the Douarne cannery where there are between 25 and 30 different nationalities.
“Extremely valiant women”
The images and testimonies also make it possible to identify the production objectives and the constant supervision to which these workers are subjected, and the physical, social and psychological difficulties linked to this particularly demanding work. “Those I met are all working shifts and, since the start of the year, their schedules can vary a lot from one day to the next due to the annualization of working time. It was a real obstacle to meeting and filming because they are exhausted and therefore not very available for anything else,” considers the Douarneniste director, who also interviewed staff representatives, themselves workers on the line for 20 or 30 years. “Their speech is freer than that of other women, because of their status. They express what the vast majority of workers they meet think but remain silent,” she assures.
For Liza Le Tonquer, “one of the aims of the documentary was to bear witness to the particularly busy year experienced at work by these women while we are celebrating the centenary of the strike of their elders, and to show what their survival strategies in relation to this very difficult work, especially since some of them also have painful personal journeys. It’s a very precarious community of women, but they are all extremely valiant.”
Practical
“Tomorrow at work”, by Liza Le Tonquer: preview at Le Club cinema, Wednesday January 8 at 6 p.m. and 8:45 p.m., then Saturday January 11 at 2:30 p.m.; broadcast on France 3 Bretagne Thursday January 9 at 11 p.m.
