Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Strikes in Bollywood country

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-01-2008, 10:26 PM:

...and speaking of "Bollywood"

Link

Strike brings Bollywood to a halt

Some workers have not been paid for months, unions say

All work in India's film and television hub of Bollywood has stopped after thousands of technicians and actors began a strike over pay and conditions.

Unions representing film employees in Mumbai (Bombay) say many members have not been paid for months and are threatening to strike indefinitely.

Meanwhile, film producers have told the BBC they will meet to decide their response on Thursday.

They say that they are prepared to weather a long dispute if necessary.

'No compromise'

"Employees sometimes work for as long as 30 hours at a stretch. There have been serious health issues and even accidents. We have been writing to producers but it got us nowhere," said Dinesh Chaturvedi of the Federation of Western India Cine Employees.

He said that workers' patience had reached "saturation point" because wages had not been paid for months and contracts were not being honoured.

Mr Chaturvedi - whose federation of 22 unions represents 147,000 members - said that in some cases wages had been withheld for up to six months, leaving workers on the verge of starvation.

The new film industry has suddenly gone quiet

Mr Chaturvedi says the Senior Artists Association is also part of his federation and are part of the non co-operation, although it is not clear if any major stars are taking part in the strike.

Daily wage workers, comprising lighting technicians and camera crew, insist that they are not ready to compromise until their demands are satisfied.

Premsingh Thakur, who heads a union mostly made up of lighting technicians, said that about 35,000 of his members had not reported for work on Wednesday.

"We do not want any bonus. We just want the wages which were decided by producers. Until this matter is solved we will not start work," he said.

The BBC's Prachi Pinglay in Mumbai says that television productions on tight schedules like reality shows are the most affected by the dispute and several shooting schedules for daily shows have been cancelled.

Those on strike range from from dancing girls to carpenters, lighting technicians to cameramen, and soundmen to script writers.

Farhan Khan, who works on the production team of a reality show, told the BBC: "All shooting has come to a complete halt. We are losing money and we just have to wait till it is resolved."

But Sushma Shiromanee of the Indian Motion Picture Producers' Association said employers were prepared to hold out for months if need be.

"There is no shooting at all today, but there is no panic here. The biggest problem is with the TV producers," she told the BBC.

"This is not only harming producers, but daily wage workers, too, who aren't earning anything because of it... They should have sat down with us to talk about this. We can wait for six months if necessary."
.............................................................

We'd be in a bit of trouble if this happened here in the states..

-Monte

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 10-01-2008, 11:19 PM:

quote: Monte L Fullmer
Strike brings Bollywood to a halt

Good! I really really really really really hope this never gets resolved and that they never ever ever make any more movies. Until they discover the mythical "reel" artifact, they absolutely do not deserve to be making movies.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 10-02-2008, 12:30 PM:

I didn't know there were any unions in India. Sort of gets in the way of making a profit if you want to fire your employees and send the jobs over there. Accenture™ High Performance, Delivered.
[Razz]

Posted by Galen Murphy-Fahlgren (Member # 4535) on 10-03-2008, 12:18 AM:

Joe, Indians aren't the only ones who ship on cores. I've had a couple of American movies on cores, including at least one brand new, straight from Deluxe in a cardboard box. I really don't see the big deal working with Indian prints unless they've been molested by a "projectionist" previously, like coming on trailer cores.

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-03-2008, 12:35 AM:

quote: Galen Murphy-Fahlgren
straight from Deluxe in a cardboard box

Came straight from the lab to your door bypassing the deposts.

Called the depot to send you the cans and reels to mount that print on when it's time to ship out?

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 10-03-2008, 01:42 AM:

Cores I can deal with (reels are still better, though). Coreless = unacceptable.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 10-03-2008, 07:54 AM:

Galen, the difference is that the cores that you got sent likely were able to be attached to a shipping reel. Like if you ask for a replacement reel, they'll send it to you in the cardboard box and you just attach it to a shipping reel to add back to the print.

Posted by Galen Murphy-Fahlgren (Member # 4535) on 10-03-2008, 09:56 AM:

Nope, the American print in question had split reel cores. I think split reels are better than shipping reels anyhow.

Joe, I have yet to have an Indian print from the lab that was coreless. A fair amount of my Indian movies are first run, so I typically don't have to deal with some of the worst things associated with Indian movies, which are really just that crappy projectionists have had their hands on them. I may be wrong, since I've only built a half dozen Indian movies so far (I've had/seen more, but at this theater I have another projectionist building on Thursdays), but new prints are not bad.

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-03-2008, 01:36 PM:

Well, that was a short strike session: Unions in India settled to get the industry back in gear.

Posted by Bill Enos (Member # 440) on 10-04-2008, 09:36 PM:

But did they pay the poor bastards who haven't been paid for months? I'll bet not.

Posted by Geena Phillips (Member # 3726) on 10-15-2008, 12:24 AM:

Galen, you've been lucky to only encounter Hindi prints so far. I've dealt with prints in Telegu, straight from the lab, that didn't have cores.

Posted by Galen Murphy-Fahlgren (Member # 4535) on 10-15-2008, 09:49 AM:

I deal with Telugu prints regularly, and Tamil and Malayalam occasionally as well, mostly first run shipped straight from India. I can only guess as to why I should be so lucky, but I won't make that speculation here. Second run, all bets are off. My example of a print coming on trailer cores was not a hypothetical.

I once had a Telugu print trapped in customs for almost 24 hours on Sept. 11. It turns out shipping a big metal box full of metal cans wrapped in a tarp from a foreign country is not a great idea on that particular date.

Posted by Laurie Higgins (Member # 4843) on 10-15-2008, 07:24 PM:

In the past when I have gotten an Indian film to break down and it came with no cores and I had none to spare I broke it down onto old trailers and commercials.