Le cri (2006)

July 1987: Robert Panaud witnesses the closure of the blast furnace at the foot of which he spent his whole working life. This funeral service put an end to 120 years of History. After the ceremony, presided over by his son, a young engineer, he reminisces and tells him about his life as a steelworker. It started in 1945 when, at the age of 15, full of hope and confident in his future, he first went through the factory gates. It petered out forty years later with his taking early retirement after a somewhat checkered working life. Robert's story is everyman's. He shares with us his joys, his suffering, his loves and his disappointments. An ordinary steelworker who loves his job and is proud to do it. He is also proud to belong to the nobility of a dynasty of workers, of which he is the last representative. In numerous flashbacks, he tells us what he knows about the life of his father, his grandfather, and his forebears. All of them were steelworkers. Marcel Panaud (1902-1930). Célestin Panaud (1878-1924) who had such a tragic fate. Jules Panaud (1846-1885) his great grandfather who died in a penal colony. And a forefather, presumably called Auguste Panaud, whose track has now been lost. We discover that, over the course of time, the worker's words are a cry. The cry to make oneself heard over the racket of the workshop. The cry of rebellion. The cry of the workers' revolts from 1830 to the present. The cry of suffering. The cry of death. The cry his grandfather made when he fell into a tank of molten metal. With sadness tinged with anger, Robert looks at the steel ingot taken out of the tank and given to the family in memory of the deceased. That is when, in front of the fireplace where the piece of metal is in pride of place near a bouquet of artificial flowers, he realizes that his life only makes any sense to him if it is linked to the struggles made by those who went before him. The history of the metal industry is that of the blacksmiths and the metalworkers, that of Robert and his son Pierre, an engineer, the finest jewel in the family dynasty. It is History written over the course of a century by the men and women of 'the Europe of Coal and Steel': French, Germans, Belgians, people from Eastern Europe, Polish, Italian, and North African immigrants who come together in this film to make this four-part story a universal one." The Cry is the final mini-series in a TV trilogy written by Hervé Baslé. The first part, Between Land and Sea told the epic story of the fishermen of Newfoundland. The second, Le Champ Dolent described the unprecedented revolution that peasants underwent during the 20th century. Following the same principles of narration and spectacle, The Cry portrays the world of steelworkers. After water and earth, fire.