Cesar Chavez is known by many as a hero in the fight for basic human rights because of how he started the National Farm Workers Association in 1962 to fight for the rights of farm workers to unionize.

Diego Luna’s film “Cesar Chavez” follows Chavez (played by Michael Peña) as he establishes the NFWA and chronicles their fight for the rights of farm workers.

The film opens with migrant workers in the fields, working tirelessly. Chavez approaches one of the men, offering to help him, but the man says no and demands that he leaves. As Chaves walks away from the field, a truck driven by field overseers asks him why he was talking to the workers.

The film then cuts to Chavez resolving to help the farm workers and taking his family to Delano, Calif., where he and Dolores Huerta (America Ferrera) start strategizing the fight for farm worker’s rights.

They, along with their friends and family, protests against farm owners. Dolores even is thrown into jail for chanting huelga (strike) at police officers.

The film does a good job of showing how much strain farm work puts on families.

The main conflict presented in the film is the NFWA’s fight to secure rights for workers in the grape fields from grape growers led by Bogdanovich (John Malkovich).

The film does a great job at showing the lengths Chavez will go to adhere to nonviolence, even fasting until every member of the NFWA signs a nonviolence contract.

This portrayal of Chavez’s fight was greatly anticipated and needed. Luna created a film that will spark the minds of many people who had no idea who Cesar Chavez was. With its all-star cast, Luna’s film sheds light on an American hero who changed the lives of America’s most dutiful and hardworking people.