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‘Harvest’ makes stars of immigrant workers and small winery owners

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<= E7<7<5 Maria shares a laugh in the vineyards. The all-female picking crew in ‘Harvest’ often relies on humor to get through tough times.

SHE HAS paid $2,000 for Grape Camp, a three-day getaway for tourists who want to learn how to pick grapes in the vineyards. She has perfect salon hair, neatly plucked eyebrows half-hidden by sunglasses, and the relaxed demeanor of, well, someone who can afford to spend $2,000 on Grape Camp. While Mexican laborers work the vineyards behind her, she speaks to the camera. “We’ve talked a lot over the last couple days about how happy everybody is,� she says, earnestly. “How happy people are. And you sort of see why. It’s a beautiful way to live.� It’s a nice thought. In Harvest, the new documentary by

BY GABE MELINE

filmmaker and journalist John Beck screening May 13 at the Santa Cruz Film Festival, vineyard workers do backbreaking work, hustle to fill bins in the dead of night, pick overtime to beat the rains, live in fear of deportation and are expected to smile when the tourist buses come rolling through. Shot entirely in Sonoma County, the 97minute documentary covers three months of the 2011 harvest and features an ensemble cast. Harvest contains no swirling and quaffing, no corporate winery talking points approved by the marketing department. Instead, it focuses on five family wineries— Robledo, Rafanelli, Foppiano, Harvest Moon

and Robert Hunter—and their struggles to get through one of the worst harvests in memory. Importantly, it follows a rare allfemale picking crew, whose members share harrowing stories of crossing the border. The film’s release is timely, and in contrast to the recent nationally televised idyll of wine country. Last month, Undercover Boss shadowed the president of Kendall-Jackson as he discovered that—shock of all shocks— people spoke Spanish in his vineyards. And in the eyes of those glued to The Bachelor this past season, a vineyard worker is a white, hunky twentysomething who just ¨ ! hasn’t found the right woman yet.

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Fruits Of Their Labor

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