Matewan

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This article is about the 1987 movie based on events in Matewan, West Virginia. For other articles with similar names, see Matawan (disambiguation).

Matewan

Directed by	John Sayles
Produced by	Peggy Rajski Maggie Renzi
Written by	John Sayles
Starring	Chris Cooper James Earl Jones Mary McDonnell
Music by	Mason Daring
Cinematography	Haskell Wexler
Editing by	Sonya Polonsky
Distributed by	Cinecom Pictures
Release date(s)	August 28, 1987
Running time	132 min
Country	USA
Language	English, Italian
Budget	$4,000,000 (estimated)
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Matewan is a 1987 drama by John Sayles, illustrating the events of a coal mine-workers' strike and attempt to unionize in 1920 in Matewan, a small town in the hills of West Virginia. Based on the Battle of Matewan, the film stars Chris Cooper, James Earl Jones, Mary McDonnell, David Strathairn, Kevin Tighe, Will Oldham, and Jace Alexander.

1 Synopsis
2 Cast
3 Locations
4 Soundtrack
5 See also
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

It was 1920 in the southwest West Virginia coal fields, and, as the narrator recalls, "things were tough". In response to efforts by miners to organize into a labor union, the Stone Mountain Coal Company announces it will cut the pay miners receive, and will be importing replacement workers into town to replace those who join the union. The new workers are African Americans from Alabama and are coming in on the train, but the train is stopped outside town and the black men are told to get off. Derided as "scabs", they are then attacked by the local miners, but are able to get back on the train and continue their journey.

Witnessing the attack is Joe Kenehan, a passenger on the train and an organizer for the United Mine Workers. He arrives in Matewan and takes up residence at a boarding house run by a coal miner's widow, Elma Radnor, and her 15-year-old son, Danny, who is also a miner and a budding Baptist preacher.

As Danny goes to preach that night at the Missionary church (the hardshell congregation, headed by an anti-union minister), Kenehan goes to meet the miners, who quiz him on his bonafides (where is Joe Hill is buried, what eye is Big Bill Haywood blind in, etc.). Kenehan says he was once a member of the "wobblies" and wins the tentative confidence of the men. One of the black miners, named Few Clothes, bravely comes to meet the union men and declares that while he can't help it if white people call him a "nigger", he takes vigorous exception to being called a "scab". Kenehan then explains to the local miners that accepting the blacks and the Italian miners is what the union is all about. If all the men are united and refuse to work, the company will not be able to operate, he says.

Kenehan and the local leader, Sephus, then go around to meet the rest of the black miners as well as the contingent of Italians and try to bring them into the union, and are met with reluctance. But later, caught between the company's guns and the local miners, the blacks and the Italians throw down their coal shovels and take up the union cause.

C.E. Lively, an agent provocateur for the coal company who has infiltrated the union, tries to goad the miners towards violence, which Kenehan says will only weaken their cause. The infiltrator also pens a note to the Baldwin-Felts private detective agency, which provides gun thugs to the coal company, saying there is a "Red" organizer in town.

The next day, two Baldwin-Felts men, Hickey and Griggs, show up in town and take up residence at the Radnor boarding house. Danny at first refuses to give rooms to Hicky and Griggs, but Kenehan voluntarily moves to the hotel, freeing up a room for the two men and averting trouble for Mrs. Radnor.

Hicky and Griggs then start their campaign against the union by forcibly evicting miners from company-owned houses in town. Mayor Testerman and Police Chief Sid Hatfield refuse to let the evictions be carried out. Hatfield deputizes all the men in town and tells them to go home and come back with their guns.

The Baldwin-Felts men then turn their attention on the strikers' camp outside town, where the miners and their families are living in tents. At night, the gun thugs fire shots into the camp, injuring some strikers. The next day, they enter the camp to demand that all food and clothing purchased at the company store with scrip be turned over to them. But then some armed foothill people, whose land was taken by the coal company, enter the camp. After expressing disdain for the noise caused by the gun thugs' automobile, the hill peoples' presence compels the Baldwin-Felts men to leave.

The union is starting to take hold at other mines in the area, but the slowness of the union's relief funds tests the patience of Danny and other miners, who become disillusioned and turn to violence, in spite of Kenehan's warnings.

Sephus and some other miners are involved in a night-time shootout with the gun thugs. Sephus is injured and is rescued by some hill people, but he sees that the infiltrator is C.E. Lively.

C.E. Lively tries to drive a wedge between Kenehan and the men by convincing a young widow, Bridey Mae Tolliver, to tell a false story of sexual assault against Kenehan. Danny Radnor overhears Hickey and Griggs talking about the scheme, but is caught and held by the two men. The agents intend to keep a watchful eye on Danny, but become drunk and are not paying attention that night when Danny, while preaching at the Freewill (softshell) church, relates a parable about Joseph that convinces the miners that they have bought into a false story. Sephus, meanwhile, has made his way back to town and informed the others of C.E. Lively's betrayal. Lively flees town by swimming across the Tug Fork River.

The situation between the Baldwin-Felts men and Chief Hatfield comes to a head with the arrival of reinforcements who will attempt to carry out the evictions. The mayor tries to talk to them, but Kenehan comes running to try and stop the fight. Someone opens fire and Kenehan is gunned down, and the mayor is shot in the stomach. Hatfield then starts firing his two pistols and the townspeople join in the firefight. Seven Baldwin-Felts men and two townspeople are killed.

In the epilogue, the narrator (revealed to be an elderly Danny Radnor recalling those days in "Bloody Mingo"), says that Mayor Testerman succumbed to his wounds and the mayor's wife married Sid Hatfield. However, Hatfield was later gunned down on the steps of the McDowell County Courthouse in Welch, with C.E. Lively stepping in to deliver the coup de grace.

Spoilers end here.

[edit] Cast

Chris Cooper as Joe Kenehan
James Earl Jones as "Few Clothes" Johnson
Mary McDonnell as Elma Radnor
Will Oldham as Danny Radnor
David Strathairn as Police Chief Sid Hatfield
Ken Jenkins as Sephus Purcell
Gordon Clapp as Griggs
Kevin Tighe as Hickey
John Sayles as Hardshell Preacher
Bob Gunton as C.E. Lively
Josh Mostel as Mayor Cabell Testerman
Nancy Mette as Bridey Mae Tolliver

[edit] Locations

The film was made in West Virginia with the town of Thurmond standing in for Matewan. Other scenes were filmed along the New River Gorge National River. ^[1]

[edit] Soundtrack

The film score features Appalachian music of the period composed and performed by Mason Daring, who frequently works on John Sayles' films. West Virginia bluegrass singer Hazel Dickens sings the film's title track, "Fire in the Hole", and appears in the film as a member of the Freewill Baptist Church who leads the congregation in acapella hymns and also sings over the grave of a fallen union miner. ^[2]