Days Of Destruction Movie Analysis

Imagine being a child, packing your bags and leaving your family and home to venture off to a new country in hopes of dreams and prosperity. In this day and age that 's kind of a scary thought, not to mention a bit unrealistic. However, for immigrants such as Eilis Lacey and Rodrigo Ortiz, that thought was very real to them as it would change both of their lives forever. While both faced a comparable situation and felt similar emotions, they both underwent very distinctive experiences upon arrival and for many years following. In the movie, Brooklyn and in the story, “Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt” there are similarities and differences between the two based on each characters experience in America as an immigrant. Each character in both

“Harvesting tomatoes and other produce from the nation’s agricultural fields is arguably the worst job in the country” (Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt 180). Workers, such as Ortiz, are often caught out in the blazing temperatures for hours on end and are exposed to harmful chemicals and pesticides. Sometimes there can be weeks with no work or wages and workers are sent back home on buses. “I only had three days of work this week,“ Ortiz says. “I don’t know how I will pay my rent” (Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt 180). The supermarket in Immokalee tends to draw a lot of immigrants in need of work, including the considerably older and more experienced workers like, 55 year old David Sanchez. Originally from Texas, David and his nine siblings moved with their parents to live in work camps in the fields. Sanchez himself, along with other workers spend countless hours a day bent over plants and transporting pounds and pounds of green tomatoes to a waiting truck. Sanchez states that the worst part is lifting the plastic mulch off the tomato beds. “You pick up that plastic and you can’t even breathe. It burns your eyes. You be cryin’ all day long. Sometimes they give you a paper mask, but the fumes go right through it. The fumes knock you out” (Days of Destruction, Days of

In the present day, leaving your comfort zone is not something most individuals would even think about doing, but in the past there have been countless people who have done so in order to achieve their hopes and dreams. Similarly, Eilis and many of the farmworkers are blessed to have an opportunity living in America but they are unaware of the difficulties that come along with it until they finally experience them. Eilis and the farmworkers are faced with somewhat similar situations, but those situations differ in the certain obstacles they each must overcome in order to retrieve a life in America. One would imagine that going to America to work as a farmworker would provide for a better life, but that unfortunately is not the case. “Mexico will put the American farmers out of business,” says Stanford, a 68 year old grower. “They don’t follow the same rules. No one says what Mexicans can and can’t spray. The labor is cheap. The small farmers are getting killed” (Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt 186). Small farmers are struggling to compete with cheaper produced that is being imported from Mexico. Complications that women farmworkers face include limited opportunities for work because women cannot handle the heavy work that most men are assigned. Women who work in the fields are often demanded sexual favors in