Fast Food Nation (2006)

Informative If A Little Slow Moving

Fast Food Nation I would rate as a good not great movie. It exposes the meat packing and food services industry as not all that sanitary and certainly not compassionate. The groups of teenagers, illegal immigrants, and phony and even unsavory corporate suits show the viewer that the all mighty dollar is king and many workers are just pawns in their universe.

There are some slow draggy moments in the film especially the border runs to pick up the illegal aliens. Nonetheless, I believe this film has started a trend of people becomming more health conscious and turnng more to vegatarianism. July 26, 2008

A disconnected effort brings down the message

Linklater produces a movie that leaves you wondering how three basic story lines were even put together in the first place. The message of the fast food companies putting their profits as their highest priority gets muddy in the story lines leaving you feeling disconnected from this powerful message. A disenchanted businessman, illegal labor, and teenage angst fail to bring the powerful message home to the viewer.

All story lines were good in their own right, and honestly could have been made into three seperate story lines, or their should have been mingling of the plot lines to make the movie stick together. Fantasic performances from a variety of famous names fail to make the movie gel, the matieral for this movie is simply lacking.

I would read the book only if you wanted to learn about the darker side of fast food. Many points in the movie are worth educating yourself, and helping you to make better decisions. A weak story line simply fails to do this important topic any justice. If this movie is on tv, and you can't find your remote it may be worth watching, but I wouldn't go out of my way to watch this film. July 23, 2008

What Were They Thinking?

As many others have already commented, this is nothing like the book even though they share the same title. The writers even stated in the commentary that the they decided to "set the book aside". Having said that I will restrict my comments to the merits of the movie alone.

This disjointed, rambling, unfocused movie tries to intertwine several stories into one:

* A successful marketing executive (Greg Kinnear) for a large fast food chain (the not too cleverly named "Mickey's") is sent by his boss on a mission to find out why there is feces in their meat
* A young woman who quits her promising (?) job at Mickey's and joins with some other activists only to find out that cows are big, stupid animals that are not at all interested in being "set free"
* Several immigrants from Mexico who are spirited into the country by a "coyote" (portrayed by the always great Luis Guzman) and find various jobs in the food industry
* A crotchety cattle rancher (Kris Krisofferson) who paints meat packers as the evil empire
* Two teenage Mickey's employees who plan to rob a fast food restaurant but never do

Although the various story lines do intersect slightly, none of them (save the plot with the Mickey's executive) really seem to have a point, and even that one ends with a fizzle.

Even though this film boasts an all-star cast the acting seems wooden and the characters are burdened with dull and meaningless dialog. The only bright spot (besides Guzman) was Bruce Willis' portrayal of a meat buyer for Mickey's where he steals the scene with his "we all have to eat a little sh*t from time to time" speech. Also, the effort to tie illegal immigration to the problems with American's addiction to fast food just doesn't gel for me.

This movie was so dull that made me long for even a mediocre documentary. It tries to take the high moral ground but fails in every attempt. There is a story out there in how America feeds itself, but this film fails to bring anything worthwhile to the discussion other than the fact that slaughter houses are nasty (did we really need to be told that?). Even the special features (animated shorts such as the Meatrix and The Backwards Hamburger) are feeble attempts to "educate" us in the evils of the industrial farming industry. In the end they only trivialize some important issues, issues that need intelligent discourse, not talking cows.

I bought a copy of the DVD based on the strength of the book. I threw it away in order to clear the space on my shelf for a more worthy title. There are plenty of good movies out there and this is certainly not one of them.


July 14, 2008

GROSS

Dont watch this is you have a weak stomach. Sick overkill with no real ending. Should have just made a docu. I don't know why at the end the wife went back to the meat plant she despised? I thought illegal immigrants all got free healthcare or at least their anchor babies do? June 17, 2008

fine exposé---even if the company in the film is fictional

Fast Food Nation is an excellent film about the very real and highly disturbing flaws that exist in a meat packing plant that provides the beef for Mickey's, a fictional fast food chain that doesn't exactly have its act together. Not only do we see how American lives are affected by this mess, we also see how desperate and sometimes frustrated, angry young people and illegal immigrants are drawn into this situation. The movie moves along at a good pace and the acting is terrific. The casting is excellent and this is one movie I must highly recommend even with a few hard to swallow (pardon the pun) scenes at the end of the "kill floor" at the meat processing plant.

When the action begins, we meet Don Anderson (Greg Kinnear) who is a high level executive at a fast food chain company. One day Don's boss informs him that some students at a university have found that there is waste matter in the meat. Don's boss orders him to the Colorado packing plant to investigate and try to find a way out of this mess.

We also meet desperate, frightened, yet sometimes angry Mexican immigrants who were so desperate for money that they illegally crossed the border from Mexico into the US. Two or three of them wind up working at the meat packing plant in Cody, Colorado. There is Raul (Wilmer Valderrama) and Sylvia (Catalina Sandino Moreno) and we also meet Coco (Ana Claudia Talancón). There are even young kids involved in the overall plot. There is Ashley Johnson who plays Amber, a cashier at Mickey's whose conscience bothers her about working there; and there is Paul Dano who turns in a stunning performance as Brian, a kid who spits in the food routinely and dreams up schemes to steal money from the fast food restaurant.

Of course, from here the plot can go almost anywhere. What happens when one of the Mexican men is injured--badly injured at the meat processing plant? How do Silvia and Coco get along when they get into the United States? What about Don Anderson--will he be able to find a graceful way out of this mess and make everything all right after all for Mickey's, the fast food chain? Watch the movie and find out!

We also get great smaller performances from highly talented actors including Kris Kristofferson and Bruce Willis. They make the movie all the more interesting and their acting is excellent, too.

The DVD comes with a documentary entitled "The Manufacturing of Fast Food Nation;" and there are four animated shorts as well. There is a commentary by director and co-author Richard Linklater and co-author Eric Schlosser as well.

Overall, I would recommend this film for grown ups--and those of them with strong stomachs at that. There is the issue of drug use in this film; and the scenes from the "kill floor" are not exactly going to help you sleep well tonight. However, if you can handle it, Fast Food Nation is a brilliant film that even allows its viewers to draw their own conclusions and opinions about these complicated topics.
June 17, 2008

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