An elegyβangry, funny, and powerfully detailedβabout the slow death of a Detroit auto plant and an American way of life.
How does a country dismantle a centuryβs worth of its industrial heritage? To answer that question, Paul Clemens investigates the 2006 closing of one of Americaβs most potent symbols: a Detroit auto plant. Prior to its closing, the Budd Company stamping plant on Detroitβs East Side, built in 1919, was one of the oldest active auto plants in Americaβs foremost industrial cityβone whose history includes the nationβs proudest moments and those of its working class. Its closing also reflects the character of the country in a new eraβthe sad, brutal process of picking it apart and sending it, piece by piece, to the countries that now have use for its machines.
Punching Out is an up-close report, at once tender and angry, from the meanest, sharpest edge of Americaβs deindustrializaΒtion, and a lament for a working-class culture that once defined a prosperous Americaβand that is now on the verge of ecoΒnomic extinction.
Media Buzz
Talk of the Nation - April 26, 2011 Tavis Smiley - January 26, 2011 Daily Show with Jon Stewart - January 19, 2011 Marketplace - PRI - January 18, 2011
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