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IMDbPro

The Garment Jungle

  • 19571957
  • ApprovedApproved
  • 1h 28m
IMDb RATING
6.6/10
1K
YOUR RATING
The Garment Jungle (1957)
Official Trailer
Play trailer2:36
1 Video
9 Photos
  • Crime
  • Drama
  • Film-Noir
The struggle of a lady's garment workers' organization to unionize a New York clothing sweat shop; the owner of which is determined to keep the union out of his business at any cost.The struggle of a lady's garment workers' organization to unionize a New York clothing sweat shop; the owner of which is determined to keep the union out of his business at any cost.The struggle of a lady's garment workers' organization to unionize a New York clothing sweat shop; the owner of which is determined to keep the union out of his business at any cost.
IMDb RATING
6.6/10
1K
YOUR RATING
  • Directors
    • Vincent Sherman
    • Robert Aldrich(uncredited)
  • Writers
    • Lester Velie(articles Gangsters in the Dress Business)
    • Harry Kleiner(story and screenplay)
  • Stars
    • Lee J. Cobb
    • Kerwin Mathews
    • Gia Scala
Top credits
  • Directors
    • Vincent Sherman
    • Robert Aldrich(uncredited)
  • Writers
    • Lester Velie(articles Gangsters in the Dress Business)
    • Harry Kleiner(story and screenplay)
  • Stars
    • Lee J. Cobb
    • Kerwin Mathews
    • Gia Scala
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 24User reviews
    • 18Critic reviews
  • See more at IMDbPro
  • Videos1

    The Garment Jungle
    Trailer 2:36
    The Garment Jungle

    Photos9

    Kerwin Mathews in The Garment Jungle (1957)
    Richard Boone in The Garment Jungle (1957)
    Robert Loggia, Kerwin Mathews, and Gia Scala in The Garment Jungle (1957)
    Gia Scala and Joseph Wiseman in The Garment Jungle (1957)
    Robert Loggia in The Garment Jungle (1957)
    Gia Scala in The Garment Jungle (1957)
    Lee J. Cobb and Gia Scala in The Garment Jungle (1957)
    Jann Darlyn, Madelyn Darrow, Kerwin Mathews, Gia Scala, and Harold J. Stone in The Garment Jungle (1957)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Lee J. Cobb
    Lee J. Cobb
    • Walter Mitchell
    Kerwin Mathews
    Kerwin Mathews
    • Alan Mitchell
    Gia Scala
    Gia Scala
    • Theresa Renata
    Richard Boone
    Richard Boone
    • Artie Ravidge
    Valerie French
    Valerie French
    • Lee Hackett
    Robert Loggia
    Robert Loggia
    • Tulio Renata
    Joseph Wiseman
    Joseph Wiseman
    • George Kovan
    Harold J. Stone
    Harold J. Stone
    • Tony
    Adam Williams
    Adam Williams
    • Ox
    Wesley Addy
    Wesley Addy
    • Mr. Paul
    Willis Bouchey
    Willis Bouchey
    • Dave Bronson
    Robert Ellenstein
    Robert Ellenstein
    • Fred Kenner
    Celia Lovsky
    Celia Lovsky
    • Tulio's Mother
    Suzanne Alexander
    Suzanne Alexander
    • Joanne
    • (uncredited)
    Alex Ball
    • Dance Class Patron
    • (uncredited)
    Benjie Bancroft
    • Worker
    • (uncredited)
    Joanna Barnes
    Joanna Barnes
    • Bit Model
    • (uncredited)
    John Barton
    • Worker
    • (uncredited)
    • Directors
      • Vincent Sherman
      • Robert Aldrich(uncredited)
    • Writers
      • Lester Velie(articles Gangsters in the Dress Business)
      • Harry Kleiner(story and screenplay)
    • All cast & crew
    • See more cast details at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      A good depiction of a "sweat shop" that used the "piece work" method of pay. An employee was paid a very low hourly wage in the "piece work" system that paid by the unit. If the worker made enough "pieces" at a certain rate, they would be paid the higher of the two: the hourly rate or the rate based on the number of pieces they produced. They system encouraged employees to work fast and to not take breaks. The "piece work" system was common across the manufacturing industry until unions put an end to it.
    • Goofs
      The baby that Robert Loggia is holding in the office and hallway of the Dress Union building is different when he enters another room. The first baby is younger with short blondish hair. The other baby is much bigger with longer, blackish hair.
    • Quotes

      Artie Ravidge: A real troublemaker, that one. But don't you worry; this stuff'll move, it'll move. When I get done with him, he won't bother us no more.

      Alan Mitchell: What are you going to do?

      Artie Ravidge: Never mind. I'm going to educate that Union real good to lay off us.

      Alan Mitchell: Dad, are you going to let him...?

      Walter Mitchell: What do you want me to do? Give in to them? Let the Union take over? That's what'll happen once they grab hold. With their hours, and benefits, and guarantees... three percent of the payroll for retirement, two percent for health, two percent for vacations... always with their hands stuck out for more. The only thing a boss can be sure of these days is an early heart attack. Who guarantees me anything?

      Alan Mitchell: How do other manufacturers get along...?

      Walter Mitchell: I don't care about the others. I built this place with my own hands and nobody's going to tell me how to run it. I wanna be my own boss. Do you understand? My own boss.

      Alan Mitchell: That still doesn't give you the right to keep a hoodlum on the payroll.

      Artie Ravidge: Oh, this boy, when he gives it to you... right under the belt. Mr "Junior Executive", when you learn the facts of life in this business...

      Alan Mitchell: Oh, I learned enough already. But never once did I hear anything about right or wrong.

      Walter Mitchell: [pause] There's no such thing in the garment business.

    • Connections
      Referenced in The Exiles (1961)

    User reviews24

    Review
    Top review
    8/10
    Tough late noir delves into labor battleground of New York in the late ‘50s
    In 1956, in broad daylight in midtown Manhattan, labor columnist Victor Riesel, who had written an expose of corruption in a Long Island union, was blinded by a bottle of acid flung into his face. This was the brutal New York battleground in which the aptly named The Garment Jungle took place the following year, a tough and absorbing drama about the fight to unionize the rag trade.

    Lee J. Cobb runs a women's-dresses firm; his ardently pro-labor partner, in the opening moments of the film, plummets to his death down a freight elevator shaft. It was no accident. Proud entrepreneur Cobb, though shaken, persists in his campaign to keep unions out of his shop by paying protection to a ruthless mobster (Richard Boone). Cobb's son (Kerwin Matthews) returns from a stay in Europe and, sympathizing with the piece-work jobbers, starts poking his nose into his father's business arrangements. He befriends a union organizer (Robert Loggia) who meets with a knife in an alley. Ultimately even Cobb comes to realize he's been dancing with the devil and tries to break off his alliance with Boone, who in turn unleashes his standard retaliation. But Matthews discovers the location of ledgers recording the history pay-offs....

    Vincent Sherman, a veteran of both Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, directed, with some measure of assistance from Robert Aldrich. But here no divas reign; both Gia Scala and Valerie French take subsidiary roles, if not small ones. Hard guys dominate the movie, as they did in On The Waterfront, another look at New York City's labor relations (while nowhere near as mythic as that epic, The Garment Jungle matches it in brutality and in an unapologetically leftist point of view).

    The movie boasts clarity and pace; there's even some nicely observed detail. Early scenes in the factory cleave into an upstairs/downstairs dichotomy: the jobbers sweat and toil for a pittance while the fashion models step into and out of elegant frocks (but, in malicious asides, the models grouse about being exploited as `escorts' for out-of-town buyers looking for a big night in the Big Apple).

    With the exception of the merely serviceable Matthews (whose young career stumbled after this movie and never regained its footing), the cast is notably fine. Cobb reins in his basso-profundo growl and curmudgeonly shtik, while Boone, Loggia (in his credited debut) and Joseph Wiseman (as a union stoolie) give restrained, convincing performances. Moments when the script threatens to go treacly are swiftly undercut by violence, and the movie never wavers from its plea on behalf of men and women risking their very lives to fight for a living wage. It's a stance that will strike many as hopelessly dated, in an era when Americans aspire to the status of stockholders; maybe that accounts for the obscurity of a bold and unsentimental film from late in the noir cycle that is brazen enough to make an overt political statement.
    helpful•30
    5
    • bmacv
    • Sep 21, 2002

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • May 1, 1957 (United States)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Language
      • English
    • Also known as
      • Garment Center
    • Filming locations
      • Manhattan Center - 311 West 34th Street, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA
    • Production company
      • Columbia Pictures
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    • Budget
      • $1,050,000 (estimated)
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      1 hour 28 minutes
    • Color
      • Black and White
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.85 : 1

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