Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Socially conscious and independent-minded documentaries have become vital links to chronicling the reality of life beneath the corporate-sponsored reality in America. No recent film better illustrates this truism than the remarkable, lucid horror film Food Inc. Other docs take on topics of varying direct relevance to the viewer base: Food Inc. touches home with virtually everyone (barring those who manage to fiercely stay off the corporate food grid and live by rules of locavore and sustainable agriculture). It has to do with what we put in our bodies for sustenance, and the pernicious forces that have radically altered that system, largely without the public’s knowledge.
Much of what director Robert Kenner deals with will be familiar to those concerned with the sea change of corporatized food production, through books by popular authors Michael (In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto) Pollan and Eric (Fast Food Nation) Schlosser, who are both extensively consulted in the film. But to see the material culled into one potent and well-made film is something of an artistic and public service.
Not surprisingly, mega-corporations behind the travesties—i.e. meatpacking behemoth Tyson, GMO titan Monsanto, and the Smithfield hog processing plant (the world’s largest slaughterhouse)—refuse to be interviewed, perhaps foolishly missing spin ops. Walmart reps, however, are seen consorting with the Stonyfield yogurt makers, in a slightly positive subplot regarding corporations co-opting into the current organic “craze.”
Instead, we hear from articulate heroes “in the field,” such as farmer Joel Salatin, who lives by codes of independence and integrity in his Virginia-based Polyface Farms. “If we put glass walls on all the mega-processing facilities,” he says, “we would have a different food system in this country.” There’s the underlying theme of the film and its ultimate message—insist on watching what we eat more than ever before.