Good Luck

American filmmaker and artist Ben Russell continues his explorations in speculative ethnography with this surprisingly moving study of two mines, in Serbia and in Suriname. Stunningly shot on Super 16mm, Good Luck restores visibility to an often unseen labour force, a politically charged product of our globalized world. Capturing the men at work in the depths of a shaft and in the blazing tropical sun, Good Luck sets up a number of dichotomies — north/south, dark/ light, movement/stasis — within its two-part structure. Both epic and intimiste, it explores how collective solidarity can arise from harsh conditions. This film about men, bodies, and proximity also marks an exciting contribution to a subject that has been wedded to cinema since the medium’s inception: physical labour.