A Volkswagen logo on the Village VW dealership is reflected in the hood of the first Chattanooga-made Passat sold in Chattanooga.Chattanooga’s economic developers plan put an award-winning film about Volkswagen’s auto plant here in its business recruitment tool box, officials said Thursday at the documentary’s premiere in the city.
“We’re on the map,” said Ron Harr, the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce’s chief executive, adding the film shows that “the word Chattanooga means something around the world.”
“The Chattanooga Story: A German Carmaker Goes to Tennessee” recently won a key award at a film festival in Cannes, France. About 350 people on an invitation-only basis viewed the 100-minute documentary, which was filmed over four years starting shortly after the city won the plant in 2008, at the city’s IMAX Theater.
Frank Fischer, the plant’s chief executive, said the entire factory’s 2,700-person workforce will receive a DVD of the film. He said an earlier viewing of the piece by about 150 people, many of whom had come from overseas to work at the plant, drew a lot of excitement — an some tears.
For him, he said, the film helped him recall more deeply the journey of how the $1 billion plant was constructed and the launch of the all-new Passat midsize sedan.