Rated R, Josie Aimes (Charlize Theron) may have only wanted to make a living, but she ended up making history, when a Minnesota coal mine (that first employed women in 1975) hires Aimes in 1989. Single mother of two children, she goes home to live with her parents (Sissy Spacek and Richard Jenkins). Her dad (Jenkins) is also an iron worker and doesn’t like the “attention” his daughter is causing herself at the plant, where the men use slang, degrading tactics, and vulgar means, to grope and plot what to do next, in hopes of ridding themselves of these females. Afterall, these women employees are robbing them of potential male spots for employment. And while the acting is incredible, this is where the movie’s elephant-in-the-room first arrives. When dealing with trailer-trash rednecks, what does a woman expect if she’s taking away an otherwise male employee position? Why not work at the grocery store instead of throwing herself in the lion’s dean? Sure, the money’s better at the factory, but let’s face it, with near death misses, why would any single mother subject her kids to this constant could-be-orphans scenario? Never the less, Aimes has one dear friend (Frances McDormand) and her attorney (Woody Harrelson) who takes on the case to bring justice and begin what would be the first women’s sexual harassment suit to change the course of America. Two and a half tiaras
