California Documentary Project
Filipinos: Forgotten Heroes of the UFW
Iris Films
Producer and Director: Marissa Aroy
The forgotten role of Filipinos in the early farmworker movement
This documentary chronicles the role of Filipino farm labor leaders in the creation of the United Farm Workers Union.
At the heart of the film is the history of the 1965 Great Delano Grape Strike, started by Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee, a Filipino farmworker organization led by Larry Itliong.
The film takes a fresh look at that strike and examines what happened afterward, when César Chávez, head of the National Farm Workers Association, and the AWOC’s Itliong formed the United Farm Workers from their separate unions.
Producer and Director Marissa Aroy, a second-generation Filipino American who grew up in the Delano area, narrates the film.