Of all the peculiar choices of family entertainment attractions, the following one is probably the most bizarre I've ever encountered. I have a friend that grew up in a vegetarian family. When he was four years old, he was taken to a slaughterhouse where he witnessed the "demise" of cattle. One doesn't have to visit a slaughterhouse to know that the beef we consume is not originated from cows who died from old age but a series of disturbing images of a slaughterhouse might not be the suitable mental dressing for a fat, juicy steak.
As for my friend, well, the experience mentioned above proved to be highly effective. He never ate meat again.
Fortunately for "Mickey", a lucrative fast food chain, there are more than plenty of people who are more than happy to pay 4.98$ for "The big one", a super sized burger that passes the pallid test of key demographics in flying colors. A test that the burger fails miserably in is a E.coli test. Put it in laymen's terms, some burgers contain, well, there is no subtle way to write this, cattle excrement.
Don Henderson (Greg Kinnear in a very good performance), a marketing manager in "Mickey" is called to scrutinize UMP, Mickey's meat packing plant. Don discovers, along with the viewers, the dark side of the mass produced fast food. The story of the Mexican Illegal immigrants who are smuggled to the states by dubious characters; The story of densely populated cow farms and the story of a factory that worships the Dollaer and nothing rlse. If the plot sounds a little familiar, maybe it's because you stumbled across "Traffic", Steven Soderbergh masterpiece that depicts the different aspects of the narcotic industry. This movie is, quite simply, the Traffic of the fast food industry and like "Traffic" the Mexican stories are much more compelling than the American ones.
Raul and Sylvia (Wilmer Valderrama and Catalina Moreno in excellent performances) as the couple who are about to find out the hard way what UMP considers them to be are much more compelling than the story of Amber, the teenage student who befriends some anti-whatever group that is set to undermine the ruthlessness of UMP. The Mexicans that go by foot and are smuggled across the border to work and live like the cattle they handle garners more sympathy than the confession of Amber's uncle, Pete (Ethan Hawke) that for ten minutes transforms the film into a "before sunrise" blabber-fest that isn't suitable to this film at all.
Richard Linklater, the director (that also directed "Before sunrise" which featured Ethan Hawke) who exposes us to both the American and Mexican aspects of this industry, leads the viewer slowly to the big climax that I will not reveal but I feel compelled to tell you, includes the disturbing footage that made my above-mentioned friend the avid vegetarian he is today.
This footage is highly disturbing, even for a veteran viewer of fight club, clockwork orange and silence of the lambs such as yours truly.
The most disturbing part of the movie though is how inflammatory and low-on-reasoning it is. Cows died in inclement ways long before the fast food era and slaughterhouses were rinsed with the red blood of cattle and poultry long before they were incorporated. If Eric schlosser, the author of the book this film is based on, tried to get me off meat (Fat chance of that happening) than his take on the fast food industry is irrelevant. If he is criticizing the fast food industry treatment of its employees, he ignores the privately owned sweatshops who, for some obscure reason, get immunity for mistreating their work force by the subversive groups of the new Millennium.
This film makes you think about it long after the end credits. A trait well appreciated in films. The problem with this film is that the more you think about it, the less sense it makes. If this website was a court drama and I was Ernie Becker from L.A. LAW (I'm a little behind on American TV) I would call the disturbing footage to be inflammatory and prejudicial. the climax footage shocked me (and everybody else in screening I attended) but it had no real conviction. Nor did the activists that their rationale seemed less of Don Quixote fighting windmills and more of the windmills.
Add your hot air metaphor here.
I guess a movie that makes you think as this film does can't be all bad, and this film is anything but bad. The script, direction and acting are wonderful and the behind the curtain look of this industry is riveting and from a basic internet research, is not far fetched, either (Let's just say that 1993 was not a positive year for the Washington branch of "Jack in the box". search it if you have the stomach for it). This film is powerful and well made but it is not suitable for the faint of heart (stomach, really) among us. Also, bare in mind that as intelligent beings, it's your responsibility not to eat every crap people might try to feed you. Regardless whether they make hamburgers or movies.
8 out of 10 in my FilmOmeter
As for my friend, well, the experience mentioned above proved to be highly effective. He never ate meat again.
Fortunately for "Mickey", a lucrative fast food chain, there are more than plenty of people who are more than happy to pay 4.98$ for "The big one", a super sized burger that passes the pallid test of key demographics in flying colors. A test that the burger fails miserably in is a E.coli test. Put it in laymen's terms, some burgers contain, well, there is no subtle way to write this, cattle excrement.
Don Henderson (Greg Kinnear in a very good performance), a marketing manager in "Mickey" is called to scrutinize UMP, Mickey's meat packing plant. Don discovers, along with the viewers, the dark side of the mass produced fast food. The story of the Mexican Illegal immigrants who are smuggled to the states by dubious characters; The story of densely populated cow farms and the story of a factory that worships the Dollaer and nothing rlse. If the plot sounds a little familiar, maybe it's because you stumbled across "Traffic", Steven Soderbergh masterpiece that depicts the different aspects of the narcotic industry. This movie is, quite simply, the Traffic of the fast food industry and like "Traffic" the Mexican stories are much more compelling than the American ones.
Raul and Sylvia (Wilmer Valderrama and Catalina Moreno in excellent performances) as the couple who are about to find out the hard way what UMP considers them to be are much more compelling than the story of Amber, the teenage student who befriends some anti-whatever group that is set to undermine the ruthlessness of UMP. The Mexicans that go by foot and are smuggled across the border to work and live like the cattle they handle garners more sympathy than the confession of Amber's uncle, Pete (Ethan Hawke) that for ten minutes transforms the film into a "before sunrise" blabber-fest that isn't suitable to this film at all.
Richard Linklater, the director (that also directed "Before sunrise" which featured Ethan Hawke) who exposes us to both the American and Mexican aspects of this industry, leads the viewer slowly to the big climax that I will not reveal but I feel compelled to tell you, includes the disturbing footage that made my above-mentioned friend the avid vegetarian he is today.
This footage is highly disturbing, even for a veteran viewer of fight club, clockwork orange and silence of the lambs such as yours truly.
The most disturbing part of the movie though is how inflammatory and low-on-reasoning it is. Cows died in inclement ways long before the fast food era and slaughterhouses were rinsed with the red blood of cattle and poultry long before they were incorporated. If Eric schlosser, the author of the book this film is based on, tried to get me off meat (Fat chance of that happening) than his take on the fast food industry is irrelevant. If he is criticizing the fast food industry treatment of its employees, he ignores the privately owned sweatshops who, for some obscure reason, get immunity for mistreating their work force by the subversive groups of the new Millennium.
This film makes you think about it long after the end credits. A trait well appreciated in films. The problem with this film is that the more you think about it, the less sense it makes. If this website was a court drama and I was Ernie Becker from L.A. LAW (I'm a little behind on American TV) I would call the disturbing footage to be inflammatory and prejudicial. the climax footage shocked me (and everybody else in screening I attended) but it had no real conviction. Nor did the activists that their rationale seemed less of Don Quixote fighting windmills and more of the windmills.
Add your hot air metaphor here.
I guess a movie that makes you think as this film does can't be all bad, and this film is anything but bad. The script, direction and acting are wonderful and the behind the curtain look of this industry is riveting and from a basic internet research, is not far fetched, either (Let's just say that 1993 was not a positive year for the Washington branch of "Jack in the box". search it if you have the stomach for it). This film is powerful and well made but it is not suitable for the faint of heart (stomach, really) among us. Also, bare in mind that as intelligent beings, it's your responsibility not to eat every crap people might try to feed you. Regardless whether they make hamburgers or movies.
8 out of 10 in my FilmOmeter