A few words from the Director

I’ve been directing documentaries for over 30 years but with each new project, I feel like a student – I restart my training, I discover new human relationships.

My greatest influence remains my natal village in Turkey. The values that were passed on to me continue to guide me and inspire my work.

I was born and raised on a farm. The first time I saw money was when I was about 8 or 9 years old. My village was self-sufficient. The peasants traded their harvests and a natural mutual support bonded the members of the community. My memory is marked by this way of life and my view of our modern world remains affected by that aim for autonomy on all levels.

When I returned to Turkey in 2001 to shoot my film l’Argent (Money), things had greatly changed. Turkey, who had been one of the seven self-sufficient countries of the world could now only, after nineteen structural adjustment plans imposed by the IMF (quotas, American wheat dumping, European sugar dumping, factory closures in the food processing sectors and the unemployment that followed, etc.), properly nourish 40% of its population. Can that be called progress?

In Money, I retraced not only Turkey’s but also Argentina’s journey, two rich countries that sank due to a major economical crisis because of their debt and where, at least in the case of Argentina, the citizens found an innovative way to overcome the crisis and reinvent the local economy; comprising up to 40 % of Argentina’s monetary mass during the economic crisis.

During my stay in Argentina, I was exhilarated to see millions of people coming together to demonstrate in the streets of Buenos Aires to the rhythm of spoons hitting empty pots. Right before my very eyes, I witnessed a change in power structure: neighbourhood and inter-neighbourhood assemblies replaced corrupt and fallen governments. My heart beat with that of every Argentinean citizen’s when I saw their solidarity overthrow four presidents in one month. When governments lose their legitimacy, mutiny becomes necessary. Argentineans exercised that right by reinventing their local economy and by occupying abandoned factories. As did the Brukman women.

I had heard of the Brukman women before my departure. Seamstresses in a men’s suits factory that had just (in December 2001) overtaken their factory after the bosses disappeared without leaving a forwarding address. The women reorganized the factory’s structure using the worker-management model, making all decisions in assemblies and giving themselves each the same salaries.

Two months after the Brukman occupation, the « workers without employers » had already become icons of a democratic Argentina. With the support of their neighbours, gathered in neighbourhood assemblies, the women withstood a first attempted eviction and a committee of watchmen was set up to protect them.

I filmed these first hours, euphoric, thanks to the enthusiasm and overwhelming public support, and at the same time harrowing. The employers, once the worst of the crisis was over, had decided to sue the workers for usurpation and this despite the charges of fraud pending against them.

When I returned to Canada to finish editing Money, I was able to count on the collaboration of some on-site people: Carlos Broun and our friends at Contrainagen as well as Roberto Leonardo, to capture the key moments in the story of these brave women who fought, not only legally but also on the streets, to keep their source of income and find dignity in the workplace.

Then I returned in 2005, after a legal victory that had granted them ownership of the machines (but not of the building), and I lived with the women for two and a half months, witnessing the daily worker-management structure. I saw how this experience had changed them, how their varied talents flourished in the formation of this business and also how their political ideas had evolved. For these women, whom nothing had prepared for such a destiny, life would never be the same.

And now?

After exploring the initiatives for economical self-sufficiency in Money, and worker-management with The Women of Brukman, I’m filming another documentary on self-sufficiency in my home of Quebec. Currently, I’m focusing on a small visionary town that succeeded putting the breaks on rural exodus thanks to its creativity. Its villagers bypassed fashionable resolutions (fiscal vacations to attract businesses, etc.) to bet on their collective intelligence and solidarity and become a self-sufficient community.

When I see individual and worldwide savvy, how can I not continue to be an enthusiast? If only I could keep shooting for another lifetime to witness that another world is possible (…the one that existed not so long ago in my hometown)!

Isaac Isitan