L’ Usine, le temps du dedans, le temps du dehors

“This is a story in which nothing bad, sad or tragic happens. There are no ‘goodies and baddies’, no victimised workers on one side and cynical bosses on the other, no open conflicts, simply a community where each has their individual career within a structure of class relations. A little more than three hundred people – workers, foremen, trainers and managers – have in common the fact that they share the same work place for a part of their lives. This is a human story that takes place in a smelting works at the close of the twentieth century. The Bouhyer smelting works, located in the Ancenis region near Nantes, has something special about it – it was among the first in France to reduce working time without any reduction in salary.” (Eric Pittard)