How food makers capture our brains with factory farms, a documentary

June 27, 1:07 AMSacramento Nutrition ExaminerAnne Hart

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Have the food makers captured our brains? Yes. Are you hungry for change?That documentary film, Food, Inc. even outdid the travel channel's video and vicarious food excursions to Majorca and Mikanos.

What Food Inc. offers are facts. And you'd wished this film would have discussed more facts in greater detail. Do you realize how much the food industry has changed since 1959? Since 1929?

What you really want from this film is for the crew to let the cameras roll inside the factory farms. Consumers rarely get to see inside factory farms. And that's from where your food originates--unless it's imported from overseas factory farms or even family farms that can afford to export items.

How much do we know about the food bought at local supermarkets? Where does the food from the weekly, mall-vendor-based or parking lot farmers' markets come from? Where does affordable restaurant food come from?

According to the Hungry for Food site, "In Food, Inc., filmmaker Robert Kenner lifts the veil on our nation's food industry, exposing the highly mechanized underbelly that has been hidden from the American consumer with the consent of our government's regulatory agencies, USDA and FDA. Our nation's food supply is now controlled by a handful of corporations that often put profit ahead of consumer health, the livelihood of the American farmer, the safety of workers and our own environment."

The movie begins with Eric Schlosser eating a hamburger and enjoying it. But the movie had a somewhat hidden vegan message for this raw foods enthusiast vegan. If this movie can at the very least get people to cut back on eating meat, that's a good thing. Food movies inspire viewers to eat more vegetables and fruits, one meal at a time.

The theme of the documentary is that the spirit and abundance of knowing our sources of nutrition has been turned into an angry, cold, stern, and destructive big corporation world of business by profit-seekers exploiting the fact that food is a necessity.

"Food, Inc." looks at a variety of food problems by telescoping the sociopathy of food as big business. The corporate food world is seen as an illness.  And the agrarian world shows viewers its perversions. The point is to showcase a growing corporate movement. Here's where the sociopathy comes in. It's pitted against the pure innocence, the "Catcher in the Rye" type of unfallen virginity of consumption. But consumption has now metamorphosed into turning a fast buck. Attitudes are shown as abusive.

The safety precautions fail because they're vulnerable and fallable. Most of all, consumers are stuck with unhealthy ingredients cheap enough to keep the food flowing from factory farm to massive markets. Two recent books form the backbone and inspiration for the documentary film.

The first book to inspire the film comes from Eric Schlosser's landmark investigative book, Fast Food Nation. The second book to inspire the making of the documentary is the thought-provoking tome, The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan.

In the documentary,both men are interviewed. The film, the two books, and the documentary's director, Robert Kenner all ask one most important question: where does our food come from?

Consumers crowd competing supermarkets and shops well-stocked with seemingly endless choices of products. When advertising illustrates a food's source, usually it's visualized as coming from pastoral landscapes full of cheer, joy, and thanksgiving. It's the media and marketing image designed to reassure and convince consumers.

The food industry doesn't broadcast too often in mainstream media those tedious grey tones of the madhouse inside the factory farms or the details of big business when it comes to a necessity such as food. You have to buy food unless you grow it in your own back yard or on an urban neighborhood plot of land. And you have to drink some type of water.

Pollan and his team of commentators want all of you to know why, how, when, and where the big food makers have captured your brains. The documentary team wants to show you who the big foodmakers are because the foodmakers advertise visually what they want you to think they are.

Here are the sites of a few good food-related and Food Inc. documentary film reviews:

How the Food Makers Captured Our Brains: Op-ed piece (NY Times)

Nicholas Kristof, op-ed on Food, Inc. (NY Times)

Lettuce From the Garden, With Worms   (Metro U.S.)

Manufactured Consumption: Interview with Film Maker Robert Kenner (Filmthreat)