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Overlooked & Underrated Docs & Features
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Men at Lunch: The Power of a Photograph
Direct from Ireland—with a quick stop at First Run Features for U.S. distribution—is this all-American hour-long documentary about a photograph taken in 1932 New York.
The picture is of eleven iron workers having lunch while sitting along a naked iron beam 850 feet above Manhattan. The men are taking a break from building New York—The Rockefeller Center, to be specific, ‘30 Rock’ to be contemporary.
Seán Ó Cualáin’s “Men At Work: The Untold Story of a City’s Legend” is all about this one picture titled ‘Lunch Atop a Skyscraper.’ He interviews authors, historians, archivists, a contemporary photographer, a contemporary iron worker, the sons of two Irish immigrants all of whom offer a cornucopia of perspectives about this one picture.
This is the power of image, of one image that speaks of New York’s and America’s history, the immigrant experience, the construction of a building, of a city and its global impact, the Roaring Twenties, the depression, 9/11 and the rebuilding of the World Trade Center. The image is as part of the City of New York as the Statue of Liberty or ‘New York’ pizza.
And this is also the power of documentary film—to create such richness of information and image into such a short film.
The First Run Features DVD includes special features about:
The 1929 Crash, Rockefeller Center, Joe Woolhead on September 11, 2001, The Inspiration of ‘Lunch Atop a Skyscraper,’ and Ric Burns on ‘Lunch Across a Skyscraper.’
Add First Run Features’ “New York in the Fifties”, and you’ve got a great double-feature.