As the son of a hard-working Cuban immigrant father and having been raised in some poor conditions during some rough times in mny life, I often saw the story of Rosa and Maya being played out in real life within the family I grew up in. The story is extremely authentic and respectful to those immigrants who must work their asses off every day for low pay. Not only this but they are humiliated and forced to live on the outer boundaries of American margins.The underpaid and mistreated workers in Bread and Roses are taken advantage of by a boss who knows that they are at his mercy due to their illegal citezenship, or lack thereof. Eventually, Janitors For Justice was established and the poorly treated workers are able to go up against the oppressive Angel company. They even avoid the "seven stereotypes" discussed in the article, "The Seven Deadly Citezens". They hold meetings, recruit, network, and encourage others who are mistreated like them to rise up for the cause of activism.Activism is about bringing social and political change. This movie shows that if enough people are passionate about the right things, they can come together and achieve their goals without violence. Sometimes violence is unavoidable, but unity is the shell that protects an activist group.

I'd like to start with a positive note: I liked the performance of Elpidia Carrillo.I did not care much for the rest of the movie.It has been shown, again and again, that trade unions are bad for the American economy. The UAW union has been "successfully" destroying the American automobile industry; the teachers' union has been no less successfully destroying the American schools; et cetera, et cetera. But these minor details shouldn't matter, should they, when we watch "Bread and Roses"? This movie, if you take it seriously, wants you to believe that without a union, the only way for a woman to get a job for herself or for her sister is to sleep with the boss; otherwise she can only support her family by becoming a prostitute.The cute female lead, an illegal Mexican immigrant, robs a gas station, but we are supposed to sympathize with her because this is "for a good cause".The male lead, a union organizer, steals the food from a table in a restaurant, and we are supposed to admire him for that and other examples of outrageous anti-social behavior.The demonstrators, when asked for their names by the police, give the names of Mexican revolutionary figures, and we are supposed to laugh at the stupidity of the American policemen.The illegals, oops, the undocumented workers, struggle to improve their lot in this country, instead of doing the same in their own country, or waiting in line to come here legally. We of course are expected to fully support them, to embrace them, to learn their language, to sing their songs. It shouldn't cross our mind that they have already broken the law of this country by crossing the border illegally and just for that alone should be treated as criminals.And that's both funny and outrageously shameful.

On the whole I have been greatly impressed with Ken Loach's other works, however, without question, this was the low point in my experiences with his films. Speaking as a Brit with a lot of North American life experience, I would say that Ken understands and portrays British society brilliantly, however, he hopelessly misunderstands American society. At one point, for example, one of the evil company bosses is supposed to be excruciatingly shamed in public by the gutsy and imaginative union organiser who crashes his lunch meeting ... only, in America, this simply wouldn't work - at all - in a restaurant like that in the US the other patrons would respect someone for making money & not give a crap what some "scrub" had to say about the percentage rate of profit that went into x dental plan, or what have you (I'm not really sure that that would work in Britain or anywhere else either - but in any event, it seems to me, never in the US & especially never in LA). As such, all the fabulous nuance that invades Loach's British based films is starkly absent in this one. Consequently, watching Bread and Roses was quite literally an excruciating experience - like watching a childhood hero fail embarrassingly, & without grace. Ken creating wooden characters? How is it possible?? (See above). I don't consider myself political. I am someone interested in ideas, fairness and justice. I respect people who approach the world with those ideas in mind. On this basis I usually have all the time in the world for the films that Ken creates. But realistically, I can't recommend this one. In the end I gave this movie a 5 & a half (then rounded up) but all of its score comes from a particular realistic, powerful and highly revealing moment. There's too much of the remainder left over, however, for that single moment to carry the whole.

I just recently watched the latest attempt from Hollywood to ease their minds about Latino issues. "Walkout" is an HBO movie that takes a historic moment in the struggle for equality and makes an "after school" special out of it. On the other hand "Bread & Roses" delivers in every front, a good story with candid acting and a solid structure. The back drop is similar. Minorities confronted with discrimination and racism must come together to force change. A basic rule of good writing calls for a story of universal value and this one resonates beyond it's outline, because the story of the immigrant in this country is everybody's story. "Bread & Roses" doesn't preach and it doesn't dumb down the intricate subtext of the story, most of all it takes the characters seriously and never uses them as just background to carry on. HBO must remember that it takes more than a Latino surname in the credits to make a Latino story resonate. "Bread & Roses" relays on the elements that are true to good film making without having to label it. Always respect your story.