ShareThisBy PHIL VILLARREAL
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Eric Schlosser's book, "Fast Food Nation" is a remarkable and illuminating read. What it doesn't seem to be at all is movie material. The volume is thick with statistics, historical anecdotes and grotesque imagery of exactly how animals are fed, slaughtered and processed.
You'd have to be either half-crazy or the most talented director alive to make the book into a film. Luckily, the movie version of "Fast Food Nation" has a man who's both _ Richard Linklater _ in the director's chair.
Linklater, whose often experimental and always talky dramas either infuriate or inspire devoted admiration in viewers, adapts the book into a compelling three-ring circus that also stands as a call to advocacy. The film contends that Happy Meals are made of cruelty and sadness, with artificial flavoring and a trace of cow feces.
Linklater worked with Schlosser on a screenplay that is nothing like its source material, but is infused with the same spirit.
In the vein of "Crash," Linklater follows disparate characters through interconnected stories.
We look in on a teenage restaurant clerk (Ashley Johnson) who's beginning to find her social conscience, illegal immigrants (Catalina Sandino Moreno and Wilmer Valderrama) who find jobs at a meat-packing plant and an oblivious executive (Greg Kinnear) of a McDonald's-like company who sets out on an investigation after he learns the truth about what's inside those burgers he mass markets.
Bruce Willis and Ethan Hawke check in with effective cameos. The Willis character, an industry insider, preaches cynical complacency and gives Kinnear's character answers he doesn't want to hear. Hawke, who plays a disheveled political activist, advocates sweeping action.
In a scene rife with symbolism, young activists slash a ranch fence, hoping the cattle will roam free. Yet the cattle refuse to move, and the saboteurs are left scratching their heads, shouting, "You're all going to die!" and "Don't be afraid!" We are the cattle, and we know we don't have to kill ourselves with saturated fat and cholesterol in foil wrapping, but our habits are too familiar to part with.
Have it your way.
4 stars out of 4
Rated: R for disturbing images, strong sexuality, language and drug content.
Family call: It's a film made strictly for adults.
Running time: 116 minutes.
(Read Phil Villarreal's blog at scrippsnews.com/philmguy and contact him at pvillarreal(at)azstarnet.com.)
