Film 27: Food Inc.

Food Inc.:
I think I still struggle with the nonfiction genre. Whether I'm qualified to judge anything is variable, because I'm just blogging, but if I were to draw the line somewhere as what I know and don't know, it would be documentaries. By and large, I'm not even a fan of the documentary as the ideal medium.

Michael Moore and Morgan Spurlock make great documentaries because Spurlock makes it into a story arc and Moore is just plain entertaining and inflammatory.

I think this particular film is educational and it's interesting, but there's no reason that it wouldn't make an equally great coffee table book or museum exhibit.

So on the whole, the film educated me and by the end of the film I was passionate about something that was wrong in society and needed fixing. The film accomplished it's goal by that end. As for whether the film was entertaining, to some degree yes, but I might have gotten more entertainment in a different format.

The film even comes across like reading a book as it is divided up into different chapters: one on corn, one on costs, one on the cover-ups of government. There's even the filmic equivalent of an introductory blurb in the form of an introductory segment before the title credits that anyone can download or stream for free.

The film makes a few sharp points filmically. The juxtaposition of the wholesome rural image on food products in supermarkets against the very unpleasant image of real life farm life is poignant. There's also one scene in which the top of the roof is shown with text that tells us the animals never receive sunlight.

It's a difficult call to make as to whether this is suited to film but it did empassion me to the issue. Far more than Supersize Me, in fact.