The Magic Bullet is the Customer: FAST FOOD NATION is Yummy :: Richard Linklater interview at David Lowery's blog
Saw Fast Food Nation last night. Yummy may be the wrong word to describe it, but the movie certainly was well done & let's say nutritious. The scenes of cows getting killed were very effective, I could not bring myself to eat meat today. FFN was exceptional for a couple of other reasons: in the story the bad guys are basically pawns of a system - a system that stays alive because of the consumer preference for meat, and the good guys are not very effective. Which makes me as the audience member ask myself: "well, what's the solution?". If the burger industry executives are too weak or basically unable to do the right thing (that being stopping or cutting back on making burgers, or at least making sure the entire burger making process is as painless as possible for everyone involved) I guess as a customer, it is up to me to help influence change by not consuming meat. That's right; cows get slaughtered & all manner of laws get violated in order to make a profit from satisfying the customer demand for meat. So, customers like myself changing our behavior will affect the whole thing. Another aspect of the movie that I liked was how human the whole proceeding was: everyone is given a chance to be likeable or at least be multi-dimensional: the illegal immigrants from Mexico, the burger industry exec, the meat supplier (played by Bruce Willis). Also, I liked the fact that one of the stories dealt with members of a minority group/illegal immigrants from Mexico. Not many indie or indie-related/smart movies reflect the existence & experiences of non-"whites" in the US, and even fewer deal with illegal Mexican immigrants as individuals. David Lowery's got an interview on his blog with FFN director Richard Linklater, check it out.
