North Country

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North Country Trivia

The Glory character in the movie was a real woman named Pat Kosmach who did suffer from Lou Gehrig's disease and died before the case was settled. She was a divorced mother of 5 children who went to work in the mines to support her children.
The movie is based on the case: Jenson v. Eveleth Mines and is reported in the book: Class Action. The Josey Aimes character was in real life a woman named Lois Jenson who went to work for the mines in 1975 and endured 13 years of harassment before filing her first legal complaint of sexual harassment. By the time she received compensation from the company (in 1999) her children were all grown up and she had been forced to quit working because she was too disabled to work (as a result of harassment). She was raped and had a son, but it wasn't when she was in high school. It was when she was older.
Some of the women standing up in the last courtroom scene were real plaintiffs.
Actor Bill Nighy stated during a Q&A session at the British Film Institute in London in 2010 that in his opinion he regards Richard Jenkins' performance in this film as one of the finest in motion picture history.
All of the incidents of harassment depicted in the movie actually did occur to various women. The incident where a porta-pottie is tipped over with a woman miner inside happened twice. The incident where a miner ejaculated onto a woman miner's clothes in her locker occurred three times. Many more incidents of harassment occurred than could be shown in a 2 hour movie.
In the scene where Michelle Monaghan is trapped in portable outhouse which is rocked and tipped over by her male co-workers, the supposed human waste was actually made of Gatorade, Coco Puffs, and pumpkin pie fillings.
Lois Jenson's had two children -- as did Josey Aimes. But, she put her daughter up for adoption when she was a toddler because Lois was overwhelmed trying to raise two children on her own, in low paying jobs. Lois' father supported her decision to work in the mine because he thought it would help her be able to provide for her son.
The lawsuit which inspired this film was settled in 1998, 10 years after it was first filed and over 20 years after the harassments began.
There were multiple trials (not just the one depicted in the movie). In the first trial Jenson and two other women petitioned to have the lawsuit designated a class action, on behalf of all women working in the mines. The judge certified a class action including only the hourly women workers at the mine, not the officer workers who were on salary, and were also sexually harassed. The second trial established that sexual harassment actually did occur and that the firm was liable for it. The third trial was about the amount of monetary damages each woman suffered and the was a disaster because the findings were ridiculously low and the women were abused by defense attorneys representing the firm. The fourth trial was in the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals which reversed on the award of damages. Finally, just prior to the start of the 5th trial to determine damages anew, the company settled, paying average damages of about $233,000 to each of the women plaintiffs.