How to go
- What: The documentary "The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant"
- Where: Schuster Center, Second and Main streets downtown
- When: 6:30 p.m. today, Aug. 19; Running time is 40 minutes
- Tickets: Free, but reservations are required, and seating is limited
- Call: (866) 717-6072
YELLOW SPRINGS — Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert are used to taking their time to make a documentary.
Their Emmy Award-winning joint effort “A Lion in the House” (2006) took nine years. So did Bognar’s “Personal Belongings” (1996), which also had its premiere at the Sundance Festival. Reichert’s Academy Award-nominated “Seeing Red” (1983), made with Jim Klein, required five.
“The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant,” which will have its premiere tonight at the Schuster Center, has been a drag race — less than a year between conception and completion.
The genesis was General Motors’ announcement in 2008 that it would close the plant.
“We thought we should get down there and see if we could tell the story,” Bognar said.
Over the next few months, it became apparent that a story with huge local significance was one of rising national importance as GM closed other plants and teetered toward bankruptcy.
HBO originally intended to air the film Dec. 23, 2009, on the first anniversary of the closing. But GM’s struggles and federal economic developments prompted a switch to Labor Day.
Bognar and Reichert learned in May that they needed to complete editing by the end of July. From start to finish, they kept the focus on the workers — people such as:
- Louis Carter, who put the official factory sticker on the last truck built in Moraine.
- Paul "Popeye" Hurst, a toolmaker for 16 years, who hopes the film "changes the perception so many people had of us down there, which is that we that we were just dumb factory workers trying to get out of working hard."
- Kim Clay, the unofficial plant photographer, whose voice is the first one heard in "The Last Truck." An electrician, he is looking for work.
- Darlene Henson, who moved to Dayton from Tennessee and was able to make a better life for her children as a result of her job.
- Kate Geiger, who worked there 24 years and describes the plant as "a gentle dragon" going to sleep. Since losing her job, she enrolled at Sinclair Community College, but said, "There isn't any work. A notice for a counter job at PetSmart brought out 200 people."
First stop for the co-directors was the Upper Deck, a bar near the plant where a retirement party was under way. They returned there many times, and also frequented the nearby El Camino lounge for worker interviews.
They often set up near the plant’s gates to interview workers on their way home.
“When you talk to someone in your car, you are in your space. People were usually very forthcoming with us as they drove out. There was a level of openness,” Bognar said.
“The Last Truck” will conclude HBO’s summer documentary film series.
The cable network will broadcast it at 9 p.m. ET/PT on Labor Day, Sept. 7. Later showings will be will be Sept. 19 at 9:30 a.m., Sept. 13 at 12:45 p.m., Sept. 16 at 12:30 p.m., Sept. 19 at 1:30 p.m. and Sept. 21 at 5 and 11 p.m.
HBO2 will show it Sept. 9 at 8 p.m., Sept. 11 at 5:10 a.m. and Sept. 30 at 2:15 a.m.
A DVD version of the film, including additional footage and interviews, will be released later. Bognar and Reichert have had considerable interest from film festivals about additional showings.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2377 or tmorris @DaytonDailyNews.com.
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