Losers and Winners – Work Is Just a Part of Life

For one and a half years, filmmakers Ulrike Franke and Michael Loeken watch as a gigantic industrial site is dismantled, documenting the stories accompanying its disappearance: how the coke workers in the industrial Ruhr Region experience the arrival and working methods of the Chinese, their feelings upon seeing their pride in their work vanish along with what was the most modern coke factory in the world, but also the strain and conflicts the Chinese workers face during their 60-hour work week far away from home and family, caught between euphoria and doubts about their future.

Two worlds collide. But who is ultimately the winner and who the loser when jobs and the ’economic miracle‘ that made them possible leave their country of origin and a whole region of Germany experiences first-hand the impact of the phenomenon of globalization, while in the Middle Kingdom new visions come and go with each passing day?