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In a world driven by competition and capital, workers of a self-managed tea factory struggle to survive against all odds.
In 2010, Unilever announced the closing of the profitable Fralib tea processing and packaging plant in the South of France. After 1336 days of resistance, the workers celebrated their victory against the giant multinational and became owners of the factory. Now, with the take-over of the company and production under workers’ control, a new struggle has begun. Can this alternative project be viable within an oversaturated, highly competitive market?
TASTE OF HOPE is the fascinating story of a workers’ cooperative on their bumpy and conflicting road to real utopia. Where idealism clashes with harsh reality, the documentary observes the factory workers as they face inevitable challenges. For two years, the filmmaker accompanied the workers in their daily struggles. Between general assemblies, cash-flow problems and tea tastings with potential clients, deception, and conflict emerge. Ultimately, the documentary poses the question: How do we need to work today so we might live in a better world tomorrow?
Laura Coppens | Director, Producer & Cinematographer
Laura Coppens is a social anthropologist, documentary filmmaker and curator from Berlin and is currently based in Bern, Switzerland. She received her Ph.D. through the University Research Priority Program Asia and Europe, University of Zurich in 2014. In the same year she joined the Institute of Social Anthropology at the University of Bern as a research assistant, teaching ethnographic media, documentary film-making, gender and sexuality as well as alternative economies. Laura lived and conducted fieldwork in Cuba, Australia, Indonesia and France.
Her Ph.D. film project CHILDREN OF SRIKANDI (2012) premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival and subsequently has been screened at international film festivals including the Taiwan International Documentary Film Festival, San Diego Asian Film Festival, Barcelona International Women’s Film Festival, Frameline, Outfest, Margaret Mead Film and Video Festival, among others. In addition, CHILDREN OF SRIKANDI won several awards like the International Jury Award for Best Documentary at the 2013 Identities Queer Film Festival in Vienna. Apart from teaching and making films, Laura also worked as the head programmer of the Southeast Asia section as well as the Queer Asia section of ASIAN HOT SHOTS BERLIN, a festival for Asian independent film and video art in Berlin. As film curator, Laura served on several film festival juries like, the Berlinale Teddy Award Jury. The documentary feature TASTE OF HOPE is Laura’s debut as sole director.
Angelika Levi | EditING & DRamaturgy
Angelika Levi lives in Berlin. She studied at the German Film and Television Academy in Berlin (dffb). From 1985 on her work has been shown at international film festivals, cinemas and exhibitions. Her short film FAUST AUFS AUGE (1988) won the No Budget Video Prize Hamburg, and DESIREE & POLYLEPIS (1994) was rated “high quality” by the German Film Classification Board in Wiesbaden. MY LIFE PART 2, her first full-length documentary, won several awards and had its premiere at the Forum/International Berlin Film Festival 2003. CHILDREN OF SRIKANDI had its Premiere at the Panorama/ international Berlin Film Festival 2012 and won also several awards. Her last work MIETE ESSEN SEELE AUF was shown in the exhibition "Wohnungsfrage" in Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin October 23th -December 14th 2015. In addition to making her own films, Angelika Levi works as a script and dramatic advisor, lecturer and film editor.
Azadeh Zandieh | Sound Design, RE-SOUND MIXING, MUSIC
Azadeh Zandieh ist a sound designer, re-recording mixer and music composer from Berlin. Currently, she is working as a freelancer and studying the M.F.A. in Sound for Picture at Filmuniversität Babelsberg Konrad Wolf.
Her passion is the cinematic screen – fiction, non-fictional, experimental and animation. Her interest is to support interesting content through conceptual sound design, in order to co-create an inspiring cinematic journey, whether it might be an emotional, artistic, or an informative one.
Prior to freelancing, Azadeh was working as a sound engineer in an award winning German post production company for commercials and audio books. The movies Azadeh workd on were screened in festivals internationally, including: Dok Leipzig (2015, 2016), Achtung Berlin (2016, 2017 Winner Best National: PANDA III), Hofer Film Tage (2016), Xposed Queer Film Festival Berlin (2016, WINNER Queer film fund: HAPPINESS), Interfilm Festival (2016), International Short Film Festival Dresden (2017, WINNER Golden Horseman Best National: ELA – SKETCHES ON A DEPARTURE), International Short Film Festival Oberhausen (2017), Semaine de la Critique de Cannes (2017), Zinebi-Bilbao (2017), Deutscher Kurzfilmpreis 2017.
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Screenings
Upcoming
Past
Visions du Réel, Nyon (World Premiere) | Winner Prix du Jury SSA/ SUISSIMAGE & Prix ZONTA
Kaleidoskop Film Festival, Vienna
Le Cinéma sous les Étoiles, Montréal
Open City Documentary Festival, London
DokuBaku International Documentary Film Festival, Baku | Winner Audience Award
Margaret Mead Film Festival, New York City | Nominated for the Margaret Mead Filmmakers Award
DOK Leipzig International Documentary Film Festival, Leipzig | Nominated for the Healthy Workplace Award
Duisburger Filmwoche, Duisburg
Ethnografische Filmtage, KinoCity 46, Bremen
Ciné-Rencontre, Cinéma le reg’Art, Buis-les-Baronnies
Travail en Travaux, Cinéma le Patio, Gex
FIPADOC, Biarritz | Nominated for the Impact Award
Solothurner Filmtage, Solothurn
DocPoint, Helsinki
Metro Boulot Kino, Geneva
Humboldt Universität Berlin
Dokumentarfilmwoche Hamburg
Ethnocineca - International Documentary Film Festival Vienna
”Between Women Filmmakers” Caravan/ Cairo International Women’s Film Festival, Bilbao
2 Rivers - Cross-Cultural Documentary Cinema, Cologne
European Association of Social Anthropologists, Lissabon
Festival Résistances, Foix
International Documentary Film Festival ELBE DOCK | Special mention
The Between Women Filmmakers Caravan Beirut
Vizanthrop Festival, Serbia
DokKa - Dokumentarfilmfestival Karlsruhe
Festival Millenium, Brussels
Globale Mittelhessen
Solidarity Tel Aviv Human Rights Film Festival
Festival RISC (Rencontres Internationales Sciences & Cinémas)
Goethe Institute China, Beijing
Let’s DOK - bundesweite Dokumentarfilmtage, Ludwigslust
Cinema Release Switzerland 2019Xenix, Zurich @ 12:00 | October 6, 13, 12, 27
Spoutnik, Geneva | November 11-15
Rex, Bern | November 22-24
BeMovie - Das Wochenende des Berner Films 2019Kino Meiringen, Meiringen @ 17:00 | 30 November
Bag Blung, Interlaken @ 21:30 | 30 November
Kino im Schlosshof, Oberhofen @ 15:00 | 1 Dezember
Kino in der Reitschule, Bern @18:00 | 1 Dezember
Filmpodium Biel/Bienne @ 20:30 | 1 Dezember
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“Unobtrusive and humane, it is reminiscent of American documentary filmmaker Frederick Wiseman’s studies of institutional cultures and workplaces. Proper to her training as a social anthropologist, director Laura Coppens is keenly sensitive to place and people. This skill for observation comes through in the film’s treatment of the factory as a unique environment, as well as its attention to daily rhythms and the interpersonal dynamics of people.”
“Instead of making grand gestures or political statements, the filmmaker works with the camera and with a thoughtful editing in order to understand how to weave together new possibilities of communal existence. The result is a superbly crafted observational exercise. A little manual of self-defense and resistance in the face of a neoliberalism that wishes for workers to keep their heads down. A taste of hope indeed.”
“Dass die Filmemacherin dabei sein darf, wenn delikate Themen besprochen werden, zeugt vom Vertrauensverhältnis, das sie während der zweijährigen Dreharbeiten aufgebaut hat. Die Perspektive ist einfühlsam begleitend, ohne etwas zu beschönigen. Am Beispiel von Scop Ti wird deutlich, wie das Bestehen in der Marktwirtschaft Kompromisse verlangt – was zwar nicht neu ist, jedoch immer wieder aufs Neue wichtig ist, gemeinsam zu besprechen. Denn die Wunschvorstellungen, wie selbstverwaltete Betriebe funktionieren sollten, können nicht oft genug an den realen Erfordernissen gespiegelt werden, die ja sehr unterschiedlich sind, je nach Branche, Grösse etc. Insofern scheint „Taste of Hope“ auch ziemlich gut geeignet, einen Beitrag zum solidarischen Austausch in Bewegungen und Netzwerken kollektiver Ökonomien zu leisten.”
“Employee-owned businesses are the future. There have been too many narratives about people losing jobs and security lately, and this is extremely important to acknowledge. But we also need to have stories that instill hope, that show that there are other options available. “Taste of Hope” is an incredibly smart film, in that it doesn’t only concentrate on the force of spirit that led the “Scop-TI” employees to become their own bosses: it also asks “what’s next?” Coppens arrived to film the factory when the rush of the resistance had already worn off, and the more mundane, but crucial challenges started adding layers to the new labor system at place. This way, “Taste of Hope” became a more complex, thought-provoking case study of workers reclaiming their agency, with emphasis on the essential practical side of things. Necessary viewing for those interested in how labor relationships will evolve in the future, with a delightful field trip to a tea-making factory as a bonus.”
