I watched Food, Inc. two times without realizing it: first, by myself, and second time with my mother, who was interested in watching it. While the documentary effectively arms the viewer with outrageous truths about the food industry, it is sadly less distinguishable from the field of preach to the choir documentaries that address similar subject matter except for people already familiar with this information.
If you are already familiar with these issues, then Food, Inc. is memorable for featuring two of the most famous journalists in this area: Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma, and Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation, which I did read and wholeheartedly recommend. The film also spawned a book based on the movie called Food, Inc.: How Industrial Food Is Making Us Sicker, Fatter, and Poorer—And What You Can Do About It, and there are even discussion guides for activists.
What makes a documentary like Food, Inc. a success: its ability to communicate information to the audience that its viewers will then remember, disseminate to non-viewers then act upon and/or its visual and narrative appeal? If it is the first, then this documentary is definitely the leader of the pack. It made even one of the best movie reviewers, Roger Ebert, a mouthpiece for its work instead of a critic of the movie. It is just forgettable enough in terms of actual structure with an appealing and terse summary to attract the same and new viewers and compel people to disseminate the information.
If I compare it to a documentary such as Dark Money, which is way more memorable in terms of location, subject, narrative structure, but is just as effective in its call to action, Food, Inc. largely evaporates. I can vaguely remember the people interviewed, but not necessarily their names or locations. This everyman, everywhere (national) quality actually works in its favor because it creates a sense of urgency as if the problem can strike anywhere and affect anyone. The story is not told in chronological order, but feels like the eternal, encroaching present even if some of the solutions presented have already been successfully implemented such as Kevin’s Law.
Food, Inc. is divided into nine sections: Fast Food to All Food; A Cornucopia of Choices; Unintended Consequences; The Dollar Menu; In the Grass; Hidden Costs; From Seed to the Supermarket; The Veil; Shocks to the System. If you think about the titles of these subsections and the topics discussed within these sections, the titles are not necessarily evocative of what will unfold on screen. Instead this documentary cleverly triggers outrage by doing the same thing that the food industry does: takes our image of how we expect farmers, animals and consumers to live then shows us the reality and its negative effects. When it shows us a reality that is closer to our fantasy of agrarian life, the viewer is more likely to see it as a solution without questioning whether it is or if there are a different set of problems by proposing this solution.
Fast Food to All Food discusses how the market changes the way that farmers work and chickens live. It outrages because it seems as if people do not have the freedom to speak for fear of repercussions and shows the ugly life of a chicken on an industrial farm. A Cornucopia of Choices addresses how there is an illusion of diversity whereas there are only a few companies and how the government is complicit in that domination through corn subsidies. If you think about it afterwards, this section would be the perfect point to list those few companies, but it doesn’t and rather focuses on animal abuse, specifically cows, which is how the first segment was also organized. So the documentary actually creates empathy with the animals and the lack of autonomy of the farmers instead of exposing specific businesses and thus permanently alienating them—possibly in hopes to convince them to change their practices.
Unintended Consequences humanizes the effect that such changes have on consumers by telling the story of a six year old who died of E. coli and how his registered Republican, academic mom became an activist to implement more regulations. It also shows how the industry responds by using more technology instead of simply returning to the old farming ways. This documentary was made in 2008, not post-2016, but I was left with a nagging sense of annoyance that I also felt while watching Citizen Koch, which was made in 2012. There is an implicit assumption running throughout the documentary that the government and business are the enemy because of their pairing and look at this reasonable Republican who isn’t like these liberals who get worked up over every little thing while completely erasing the fact that reasonable Republicans vote for people in government who destroy regulations then get annoyed when the lack of regulations hurt them. In Food, Inc., at least it shows this mother explicitly working on both sides of the aisle, but out of a fear of appearing partisan, these documentaries neglect to hold people such as her accountable for these poor decisions that result in tragedy. You’re going to keep getting deregulation if you don’t learn how you got there in the first place.
The Dollar Menu shows the deleterious effect that cheap food has on one family’s health, but healthier food is too expensive. In The Grass compares and contrasts industrial farming with a more traditional approach then sparks our outrage when it is revealed that the industrial farm are considered more up to code when the traditional approach seems on the surface to obviously be better. There is also an intersection of corporations courting and exploiting undocumented workers with no fear of law enforcement on the corporate level. Hidden Costs shows how organic products are trying to expand to meet market demand by pairing with big business. Food, Inc. does show that the old school farmer, Joel Salatin, can’t meet demand without changing what makes his farm so appealing. While pairing up with Walmart may be great for the organic industry because it can reach more customers than at other markets, the film kind of glosses over the fact why so many in the organic industry disdains Walmart. So this documentary never fully addresses a feasible solution that does not lead to the organic farm industry becoming more industrialized and leading to worker or animal abuse. It sounds like a clever bit of rebranding to counter any criticism before it is leveled at the organic industry for expanding. From Seed to the Supermarket specifically singles out Monsanto and its efforts to control people not in business with them. Why did Food, Inc. feel comfortable singling out Monsanto and Tyson and no one else?
The Veil shows how the government’s laws protect businesses like Monsanto more than individuals unless you’re Oprah, which is as close to a person gets to being a business. Shocks to the System is the concluding chapter about the effect of the market on the world and how people have stopped big business from running amok such as in the tobacco industry.
While Food, Inc. is one of the best preach to the choir documentaries because it is effective at appealing to emotion while delivering facts by eliciting outrage at the dissonance between the image and reality of the farmer and the animals, it also seems to be laying the ground work to get its piece of the pie and pair up with big business without adequately reflecting on what makes industrialization toxic in the first place. Stagnant wages and larger profit margins will always lead to some form of abuse. While it is admirable to aim at creating food that is healthy and inexpensive, will it also just as zealously advocate for immigration reform and a fair wage? Normally I would excuse a documentary for not exhaustively covering every topic, but since these are issues that contribute to the problem, the film should have explored them more in the solution category. I believe that it didn’t because the goal of organic farming is to expand and make money by pairing with the giants while producing a good product, but not necessarily eliminating all abuse.