UNION (2024) with filmmaker Brett Story in-person

Filmmaker in person!
In 2020, in the midst of a global pandemic, historic supply chain disruptions, and soaring profits, Amazon workers at Staten Island’s JFK8 Warehouse launched an unprecedented unionization attempt. Led by charismatic organizer and fired warehouse worker Chris Smalls, the effort drew national attention, as well as a powerful corporate backlash that pitted old-school union-busting against 21st-century digital solidarity-building. Filmmakers Brett Story (THE HOTTEST AUGUST; THE Pr*son IN TWELVE LANDSCAPES) and Stephen Maing (CRIME + PUNISHMENT) capture this dramatic labor struggle in real-time in UNION, a film that updates the classic techniques of direct cinema observational documentary for an era of Zoom meetings, social-media activism, and electronic countersurveillance. 
For this screening, co-director Brett Story will appear in person to introduce and discuss the film, including the decision to self-distribute a work that dared to challenge one of the most powerful companies in the contemporary media landscape.
Story’s visit is co-sponsored by the Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities, which will welcome the filmmaker for their Public Humanities Keynote on Wednesday, February 11, 2026. More info on the keynote talk here: https://planitpurple.northwestern.edu/event/636642.

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