Making of the first Chevrolet Motor Cars in the 1930's
74Classic "capitalist realist" drama showing the manufacture of Chevrolets from foundry to finished vehicles. Though ostensibly a tribute to the "master hands" of the assembly line workers, it seems more of a paean to the designers of this impressive mass production system. Filmed in Flint, Michigan, just months before the United Auto Workers won union recognition with their famous sitdown strikes. Released the same year as two other films with which it shares similarities: MODERN TIMES and TRIUMPH OF THE WILL. Selected for the 1999 National Film Registry of "artistically, culturally, and socially significant" films.
Shotlist
"A BEAUTIFUL DRAMATIZATION OF HOW THE MASTER HANDS OF CHEVROLET CRAFTSMEN FORM THE PATTERNS, TOOLS & DIES, & CONTROL THE HUGE MACHINE THAT FASHIONS THE MODERN CAR."
Molten metal flowing into a mold spells out the film's title in heat and light. A full symphony orchestra plays a score adapted from Wagner's Die Walk re. Negative and positive film sandwiched together (a rare effect in the 1930s) casts a surreal filter over workers filing into the factory. This is high drama, pretentious filmmaking and one of the most impressive records of mass production ever made.
1936, the year that Chaplin's Modern Times and Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will were produced, was also the year of Master Hands. Produced ostensibly as a tribute to the "master hands" of the Chevy craftsmen, Master Hands looks much more like management's own tribute to itself -- the designers of the system of mass production.
Embodying a genre that might be called "capitalist realism," this featurette uses the representational methods of the Soviet and German cinemas to strengthen its vision of American enterprise. From Thirties Soviet socialist realism Master Hands borrows a concern for presenting masses of mobilized workers, a fascination with larger-than-life machines, and a sense of economic emergence through technology. From the Germans, and specifically from fascist representation, it appropriates the mythology of the four elements (showing how earth, air, fire and water are all part of automobile manufacturing) and adapts Wagner's music which, in its original form, portrays the foundry of the gods. Valuing intuition over interpretation, it avoids even narration except for one bit near the beginning:
"From the master hands of the toolmakers --
to the hands that master the great machines --
come the tools and patterns and dies...
and then the great factories start."
Nonetheless, its producers were documentarians enough to show something of the Flint factory's actual nature. While the machines and assembly lines are all presented heroically, the human element appears guarded, fatigued and vulnerable to accident. A long look at the faces of workers shown in the film reveals how the stresses of their jobs have made them look much older than their years. Among industrial films, it is a rare example of documentary verity, I think, an unusual instance in which truth resides in the image itself, regardless of its maker's intentions.
Strikingly, the filmmakers take pains to skirt the major issue affecting both workers and management in the Chevrolet plants -- that as Master Hands was being shot, the factories were contested territory.
Master Hands is a glimpse of the last year when management ran the plant according to its own rules. In the Central States, automobile production had recovered from its Depression slump by the mid-Thirties, and a long accumulation of grievances led auto workers to form a solid (and secret) organization. Late in 1936, Chevrolet workers, first in Flint and later throughout Michigan and the United States, "sat down" on the job, stopping production, sequestering key tools and dies, and occupying factories to enforce their demands for union recognition. This legendary strike forced the company to recognize and bargain with the United Auto Workers, which resulted in better wages, benefits and greater dignity for the workers of America's key industry.
HANDS CHEVROLET ADVERTISING AUTOMOBILES TRANSPORTATION MANUFACTURING FACTORIES INDUSTRY WORKERS LABOR ASSEMBLY LINES PATTERNS TOOLS DIES METALS FLINT, MICHIGAN LABOR HEAVY INDUSTRY WAGNERIAN MUSIC CAPITALIST REALISM TIRES TOOLS