‘Food, Inc.’ investigates meat industry

my Award winner Robert Kenner, lays out the imagery and information of the food (packing) industry right before our hungry eyes. As the age of “going green” continues to blossom, Kenner figures that we, the American public, deserve to know from where our food comes. His reasoning and call to action are certainly admirable, but his passion for the end product of the film occasionally impedes his true message.
The first half of “Food Inc.” is mostly objective, typing out statistics and facts to get the point across. A narrator explains that as chickens are pumped with chemicals in order to speed up their growth and impending death, their existence on Earth rapidly becomes one of pain and uncertainty. The chickens’ bodies become the size of small pizzas, and all they can do is waste away their contained existence by sitting in their coops.
With the chickens, Kenner relies heavily on film-footage to emphasize his point. The footage of factory workers chucking chickens down a transport tube to be manhandled by another factory worker who brands them carelessly with a stamp is enough to make anyone cringe.
The documentary continues to focus on chickens at another farm. In even more gruesome fashion, the birds are pulled abruptly from their cages by a desensitized factory worker and stuffed down a cylindrical tube where their throats are slit. The footage from this farm also features images that further emphasize the horrible treatment of domesticated animals: the viewer sees footage of cows stuck and disgustingly camouflaged in their own manure.
 The public’s interest, however, can only be partially maintained by animals. So, the director subtly shifts focus to a more emotional, human story that follows a mother who has recently lost her toddler as she travels to Capitol Hill. Her son died 12 days after eating an E. coli-contaminated hamburger. Because of the tragedy of such an event, the mother travels to DC to push for her representatives to pass Kevin’s Law.
An authentic, vintage home video of a little boy plays as the mother emotionally describes her son’s last days and the lack of effort the meat company took in recalling the infected meat.
Later, another family describes its daily visits to McDonald’s. They live off of the fatty, greasy foods from the “Dollar Menu,” because they cannot afford vegetables. Tragically, fresh foods are more expensive than the chemically treated hamburger meat. Is it a coincidence that this family is entirely Hispanic and lower-middle class? No— Kenner consciously chose this family because he knows that a large part of his audience are recent Hispanic immigrants who desire to break apart from the monopolizing fast-food industry.
Kenner beautifully and intelligently weaves emotion and logic and manages to connect various Americans’ lives into one cohesive entity until the very end of the film. In all his heated passion, Kenner wants to blame someone for the meat industry’s atrocities. At one point, he plasters conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’ picture and declares him a Monsanto lawyer—the chemical giant that has an unrelenting hold on the impoverished corn farmers of America.
Kenner seems to believe that because Thomas was a Monsanto attorney and wrote the majority decision on an important environmental court case, that he must be part of the problem. The fact that Thomas used to work for Monsanto does not mean that he has major influence over other Justices’ decisions.
Throughout the enitre documentary, Kenner never once attempts to speak with or listen to the chemical industry’s executives. He is too far into the rebellion he wants to create to try to understand the industry’s point of view, which ultimately portrays him as an extreme environmentalist with a politicized agenda.
The documentary ends with commands to the audience. Kenner’s final inspiration, in the form of a question, asks, “Hungry for Change?” Although seemingly Obama-inspired, the quote does reinforce the call to action and Kenner’s message does advocate the downfall of the food industry monopoly.
“Food, Inc.” is truly a fine blend of information and emotion. It maintains a clear focus and remains steadfast in its approach. Kenner, however, seems caught up in the whirlwind of change that Obama spun, which ultimately hurts his ethos. We want change for the consumer’s sake, not change for a political agenda.  

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