Chircales, the title of Martha Rodríguez and Jorge Silva's potent documentary, translates as The Brickmakers in English. Between 1966 and 1972, while they were working on it, 50,000 Columbian workers participated in this poorly-regulated industry. The film opens with a worker talking about his life over images of present-day Bogotá. He explains that his parents always voted Liberal, so he does the same. In Columbia, the red of the Liberal Party "stands for the blood that was spilled during the war," but the worker laments that his votes have made no difference, leading him to wonder whether he should continue casting ballots for elected officials who don't care whether he lives or dies.
Rodríguez and Silva move on to an audio interview with a politician who decries income inequality in Columbia over footage of Alfredo, Maria, and their 12 children in Tunjuelito, hacking away at a rocky hill with large hoes. Like other brick makers, the Castañeda family works on rented land from which they fill, empty, and refill wheelbarrows with the material for brickmaking. After the youngest members wheel the particulate to Alfredo, he mixes it with water, using a donkey-powered cement mixer, to create a concoction his oldest daughters press into brick-shaped molds while listening to soap stories on a transistor radio. For the final step, they fire the bricks in a kiln, a process that takes several weeks.
Since they don't own the land and receive payment per piece, it's easy for renters, aka bosses, to exploit workers. With no unions or labor laws to rein renters in, they set schedules according to their whims--the Castañedas frequently work from 5 am to 6pm. Renters also threaten to fire workers who don't vote, though it isn't clear if they pressure them to vote for specific candidates.
Alfredo, a 32-year veteran brickmaker, knows he's being exploited, but he doesn't see an alternative. His kids worry about his health, his drinking, and his temper. They also express concern that their mother is pregnant again. Maria doesn't understand why it keeps happening, an indication that she lacks access to both education and contraception. (Father, mother, and children all take turns narrating.) At times, the sound disappears, and the family appears to work in silence, linking Chircales to the documentaries of the silent era, since brickmaking probably worked much the same way in the 1920s.
There isn't much light in this film, but there is beauty, particularly in a confirmation sequence featuring a white dress, veil, and gloves. The married filmmakers follow this moment of loveliness with a funeral in which a widow wails for her husband, knowing she'll soon end up on the streets. Chircales opens with an epigram from Karl Marx and ends with an illustration of his warning about the alienation of man from labor. Silva and Rodríguez's film inspired real change in its native country, particularly in regard to child labor laws. Recommended for Latin American, Labor Studies, and Workers' Rights academic library collections.