• Detriopia Moview Review

13- Maham Hayat

23- Ramsha Ali
34-Ramsha Nasir Malik
• Detropia is a film made by Hiedi Ewing and Rachel Grady which follows the journey of the residence in Detroit
struggling with the economically bleeding city. It focuses on the decline of the economy of Detroit due to long-term
changes in the automobile industry, and the effects that the decline has had on the city's residents and
infrastructure.

• This movie briefly takes us around Detroit and into the hearts & minds of its sparse population. We see that the
only thing surviving and thriving is the indomitable spirit of its citizens.

• In Detropia, directors Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady film local residents to profile the economic decline of the city
of Detroit, demonstrating how Detroit is representative of the effects the shifting global economy has had and
continues to have on North Americans.

• Ewing and Grady focus on three citizens in particular, George McGregor who is President of the UAW Local 22, Tommy
Stephens owner of the Raven a blues nightclub, and Crystal Starr a video blogger.
North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), controversial
trade pact signed in 1992 that gradually eliminated most
tariffs and other trade barriers on products and services
passing between the United States, Canada, and Mexico.
• In the past 10 years, the state of Michigan has lost fifty percent of its
manufacturing jobs.
• 50,000 factories have closed and 6 million workers have lost their jobs.
• Trend is not restricted to Michigan or the US, as Canada has seen similar
closures and job losses.
• With the loss of its manufacturing base, the population of Detroit has
moved on and away.
• In 1930, the city of Detroit was the fastest growing city in the world but
today it is the fastest shrinking city.
• The 2010 census shows Detroit's population dropped to 713,000 (the
lowest in 100 years.)
• Population loss means large areas of the city are under-inhabited.
• Because of the shrinking population, the city of Detroit can no longer
afford to service these largely abandoned areas.
• City is 139 square miles with 40 square miles of potential vacant land.
This has led Detroit Mayor, David Bing, to bring in urban planners to help
the city decide how best to restructure land use.
• Rethinking the way a city normally uses its land.
• Bing proposes that residents in neighbourhoods that are dying, be
relocated and the empty areas be used for urban farming.
• Plan did not sit well with residents who accused the mayor of downsizing
the city.
• observe that the inner city has seen a modest population growth
because of young people taking advantage of bargain rents. We meet
one such couple, who assemble a long table in an urban wasteland and
sit at it while wearing golden steampunk gas masks. Their goofiness
makes a contrast to the bleak cityscape behind them. Throughout the
film, there are glimpses of the golden days, of sleek new models and
glamorous car ads. Stevens takes the camera on a long drive past where
the main Cadillac plant once thrived. "We built everything," he said. "In
the war, they switched over to bombers. Everything." He is driving past a
barren landscape
• failure of the Chevy Volt. Stevens’ bar, the Raven Lounge, is only a few
blocks from a shuttered GM plant. The plant closure naturally hurt his
business. When he hears that the new electric Chevy Volt will be built
there, he’s excited at the prospects.
• However, on checking out the Volt at the auto show, he notices serious
problems, notably the short distance it can travel on a charge, and the
high price tag, particularly in comparison to new Chinese competitors.
• MacGregor’s UAW local receiving news of American Axle’s new wage
proposals, ones that include big pay cuts for people who are barely
earning a living wage as it is.
• Here we see the destruction of the American middle class as a real life
work in progress. This a type of scene that’s been replayed far too often
across America. (The UAW rejected the proposal outright and the plant
closed).
• Tommy Stephen's visit to the Detroit Auto Show. At
the show he views many of GM and Chrysler's newest
products. The big three automakers are finally on the
rebound, after a US government bailout and new
employee wage cuts. Stephens goes over to
investigate the BYD (Build Your Dream) booth, a
Chinese automaker at the show marketing its
competition to the Volt. The BYD retails for $28K while
the Volt sells for $40K. When Stephens confronts the
Chevrolet showmen, they don't have an answer as to
why there is such a price difference. A year later,
Chevrolet announces it is moving its Volt factory to
China, in exchange for sharing its intellectual property.
• "the hollowing of the economy's core." Basically, we don't manufacture things
anymore. It's a way to deprive unions of bargaining power and to use cheap,
equally competent labor to maximize profit.
• The poster image for the documentary shows two artists, who make their home
in Detroit, wearing gold painted gloves and gas masks in front of an abandoned
mansion. It is a allusion to the fact that people can survive and adapt to life in
Detroit. The people who seem to be doing so are young people who see the city
as providing the freedom to experiment.
• Of course the answer to this question which is never openly expressed in the film
but only hinted at by George McGregor, is that American industry throughout the
first 80 years of the 20th century, following the business models set out by Henry
Ford, paid its workers a "living wage" - creating a middle class who brought the
products made by other manufacturers and who were able to buy a home,
educate their children and so forth.
• upper class will have problems with the lower class if we wipe out the middle
class when u see ur neighbor going down then u have to think about yourself and
save the neighbor cuz if u don't then that fire is also coming to brother called
From Florida capitalism is a great thing but it exploits the weak it always does no
• buffer between rich n poor