You will never look at dinner the same way
Journalists Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser, who star in a documentary by Robert Kenner titled Food, Inc., broaden the attack on ‘Big Food’ on the basis of health, labour and the environment. After conceding the efficiency of the enormous slaughterhouses that churn out hundreds of thousands of identical pork chops each day, the film brings a litany of complaints against factory farming. It shows how US grain subsidies have led to the overconsumption of corn syrup and grain-fed meat; and how a ‘revolving door’ between agribusiness and the US Food and Drug Administration has led to a sharp decline in livestock inspections despite persistent bacterial scares.
The film depicts how big companies can ruin small farmers by suing them for replanting their patented seeds, and tracks the growing backlash among a handful of agricultural rebels, including a rancher from North Carolina who prefers to slaughter his own grass-fed animals and a dairy tycoon who believes he can “save the world” by selling more high-end yogurt to Wal-Mart shops. If there were any doubt about the film-makers’ sympathies, the closing credits counsel viewers to buy healthy, organic and local products.
