When the last factory in a small Rust Belt town closes its doors, an unlikely hero emerges in dutiful, quiet Allery Parkes. A career employee of the factory, the aging Allery can't reconcile how to live a life simply sitting at home doing nothing. Against the advice and pleas of his loving wife Iola, he forms an unlikely friendship with his charismatic neighbor Walter Brewer in order to revive the defunct factory.
Acting
Peter Gerety's hands do more acting than most performers' whole faces.
Direction
Jury makes empty factory floors feel like sacred cathedrals.
Sound
The hum of absent machines becomes its own character.
Director
Robert Jury
Peter Gerety
Allery Parkes
Billy Brown
Walter Brewer
Talia Shire
Iola Parkes
J. Salome Martinez
Benny Mendez
Patrese McClain
Cecilia Brewer
Bobby Richards
Stan Gordman
Kirsten Fitzgerald
Marg Maldonna
Mike Brunlieb
Roger Hendriksen
Barbara E. Robertson
Bonnie
Matthew Russell
Brandon the Local Reporter
Bea Cordelia
Check-Out Clerk
Marc Grapey
Unemployment Line Man
Bradley Grant Smith
Pastor Mark
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Director Robert Jury grew up in a decimated Rust Belt town and wrote this after watching his father struggle with retirement. The 'ghost factory' phenomenon — where laid-off workers still show up — is documented across Midwest America.
Peter Gerety was 79 during filming and insisted on doing his own factory floor walking; that limp is real, from a decades-old injury he never corrected. The limp becomes part of Allery's ritual, his body remembering work his mind can't release.
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