Balance of Food

Film review: Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain

They say you should never meet your heroes, how you will be disappointed in who they are as opposed to who we imagine them to be.

Roadrunner starts out as a film chronicling how Anthony Bourdain became famous. Even if Bourdain were still alive, this would be a great documentary subject. Bourdain, up until his 40s, led an interesting life that virtually no one knew about.

Kitchen Confidential. Then the videos started: A Cook's Tour. No Reservations (with The Layover). Parts Unknown. Each of those shows under different umbrellas and approaches, showing a more maturing Bourdain along the way. Given that this part of his life started when he was in his 40s, his work got more mature as the shows changed. You could argue they were all food and travel shows. He didn't eat that much in the first and third shows. Parts Unknown was about, as David Chang put it, Bourdain trying to be a better person.

Morgan Neville then steers the documentary boat into the curious yet futile question: "Why did Anthony Bourdain kill himself?" Neville asks the people around Bourdain and they gave their take. Ottavia, his second wife, gives her perspective. People talk about how devoted Bourdain was to his daughter, Ariane Busia-Bourdain.

There are the theories. Bourdain wanted to slow down but didn't know how to make that move. Bourdain's second marriage crumbled. Actor/director Asia Argento stepped in. Was she the reason?

A documentary should be judged on who doesn't get interviewed. Neville made a case for not interviewing Argento. We hear about the Hong Kong episode story. The looks on people's faces change when they talk about that episode. The one person who had an intriguing story about that episode was longtime cinematographer Zach Zamboni. Zamboni was fired during the shoot over a dispute between Zamboni and Argento, who ended up directing the episode.

Neville takes us down this path knowing there won't be a nice neat bow to the story of Bourdain. His addictive personality is on display. Artist David Choe says Bourdain is the only person who gave up heroin without treatment. What made Bourdain great on TV in his food travels was the addiction for something more. Most people making TV aren't getting better. The adaptation to different levels of Bourdain were part of that addiction. Bourdain got involved with jiujitsu in part because his wife competed in the sport.

Roadrunner won't be the solution Anthony Bourdain fans want

Bourdain Day 3: How Anthony Bourdain helped me get through a pandemic

On the second Bourdain Day, how Anthony Bourdain would handle a worldwide pandemic

Bourdain Day is a way to celebrate the love of food and food cultures

Neville has a good reputation as a documentary filmmaker. See the Academy Award winning 20 Feet from Stardom or Best of Enemies on Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley or Won't You Be My Neighbor? about Fred Rogers.

Being curious about why someone killed themselves is worthy of a documentary. Cutting corners to get to that point is a bad sign. The use of Bourdain's voice in an e-mail through AI is a terrible move for a documentary. You don't gain anything from the shortcut. Many other things that Bourdain did say are portrayed in a manipulative fashion.

If you are a fan of Anthony Bourdain and his shows, you know Bourdain has countless mentions of death, especially his own death, on the shows. This doesn't always mean suicide will happen but this is a clue to consider.

We don't learn a lot about Bourdain in the second half of the film, except that he had flaws.

"You don't want his legacy to come off as like somebody who succumbed to this darkness. That wasn't him. Like he created something that was so important — and I want — that really needs to be like — that is the legacy of his life. Not this stupid bullshit that he did at the end." — Lydia Tenaglia, co executive producer of Zero Point Zero Production.

The flaw in Roadrunner is that the film is much more about that "stupid bullshit."

Laurie Woolever interview on Q with Tom Power (CBC Radio One)

Anthony Bourdain legacy: Find your own food adventure

Anthony Bourdain takes CNN's Parts Unknown to the mysterious land of Newfoundland

If you want to learn something about Anthony Bourdain, watch this film until it turns dark. Otherwise, watch No Reservations (we are partial to that version) or Parts Unknown.

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Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain is available for rent. The film is scheduled to air again on CNN on Saturday at 10 pm Eastern.

video credit: YouTube/Focus Features
photo credit: Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain

Bourdain Day 3: How Anthony Bourdain helped me get through a pandemic

The Vietnam episode when he thought about living near a rice field. The San Francisco episode where he managed to hit every old school joint. The Thailand episode where he arrives at a moment of political unrest. The Jamaica episode exploring the food element of being a Rastafarian. How his Sichuan obsession made its way to Melbourne.

I watched a lot of Anthony Bourdain during the pandemic. Places I've been. Places I want to go. Food I want to eat.

These episodes came from Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations, the best known of the Bourdain TV library. The Layover felt like a spinoff of sorts late in that era. A Cook's Tour ran on the Food Network from 2002-2003. This is the saga Bourdain refers to when approaching a place with a more mature outlook.

The even more mature approach came with Parts Unknown, Bourdain's final series. You might have your favorite chapter of Bourdain's TV work or you enjoy all of them.

You want to travel but can't, literally can't. You want to eat this food over what you are actually eating.

On the second Bourdain Day, how Anthony Bourdain would handle a worldwide pandemic

Bourdain Day is a way to celebrate the love of food and food cultures

"Where do you want to go today?" Like virtual reality but TV and streaming your way around the world. Last year, we focused on what Bourdain might do during the pandemic. Watching Bourdain was about what you would do if you could travel like it was 2019, not 2020 or even 2021.

Watching him travel and eat his way through the world was fun but frustrating in that you couldn't be there. You could make an analogy of watching porn vs. having sex but quite frankly, I would rather travel and eat in the Anthony Bourdain way than ever have sex or watch sex again.

The episodes did fill up time and gave some solace in a world where we couldn't just escape with a new travel and food adventure.

Hope is relative but watching Bourdain travel and eat around the world offered up hope for a better world.

Laurie Woolever interview on Q with Tom Power (CBC Radio One)

There are new projects, chances to get a final sense of Anthony Bourdain. World Travel: An Irreverent Guide from Laurie Woolever and Anthony Bourdain comes from Bourdain's long-time assistant. The project started before Bourdain's death in 2018. The book is more about travel than food.

Roadrunner: A Film about Anthony Bourdain is a documentary from Morgan Neville (Won’t You Be My Neighbor? and 20 Feet From Stardom). The documentary features Bourdain clips and interviews with those who knew him well.

The film already debuted at the Tribeca Film Festival. The theatrical release is set for July 16. If you aren't ready for theaters, the documentary will run on HBO Max and CNN.

Tom Vitale, a long-time producer and director, will have a book out this fall. In The Weeds: Around the World and Behind the Scenes with Anthony Bourdain has a release date of October 12.

Anthony Bourdain legacy: Find your own food adventure

Anthony Bourdain takes CNN's Parts Unknown to the mysterious land of Newfoundland

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Bourdain talked a lot about death, his death in a lot of episodes. That wouldn't be as much of a surprise, even if he were still alive.

Andrew Zimmern came up a few times. I like Zimmern and also enjoyed the nudges Bourdain gave him. Zimmern does a very different perspective even if they both travel with food in mind.

A part of me still wants to have the kind of life he had: travel and eat. There is a need for such programming, though television isn't my strong suit. I am not as brave as he was for eating certain foods. His love for sea urchin is enough to get me to try some, eventually. I have some talents as a writer but Bourdain's ability to communicate the high-end and low-end in food is a tremendous gift.

Be a Traveler, not a Tourist

This is reportedly one of Bourdain's quotes. We might get a second chance to travel and appreciate other places on this planet. Go for neighborhoods; go for what is special where you are. Appreciate what you have and where you are.

photo credit: Instagram Anthony Bourdain
video credit: YouTube/Focus Features

Film review: Meat the Future

One innovation that we would love to see is cloned meat. The goodness of meat without the animal sacrifice. The primary drawback has been availability and cost. Meat is expensive in most of the world with the United States as a grand exception.

Meat the Future takes us into the world of cloned meat, mostly by following Memphis Meats over the last few years. The film specifically follows Memphis Meats CEO Uma Valeti, a cardiologist turned entrepreneur. We even go back to India, where Dr. Valeti is from. He tells a story about chickens being slaughtered at a child's birthday party when he was young.

“If I practice cardiology for another 30 years, I would probably save two or three thousand lives. But there is very little, in the form of any idea, that even comes close to the level of impact of what this could impact on billions of humans lives and trillions of animal lives,” Valeti said.

We spend part of the film looking at the company expanding to larger spaces. Nice but not relevant to the subject.

The film also covers the agency alphabet soup battle between the FDA vs. the USDA. We see the nuance of what to call the end product: clean meat as opposed to cultured meat or lab-grown meat.

The film feels like a business case study in general instead of a conversation about cloned meat.

At one point, they talked about growing corn and soy to feed the cells. "Why wouldn't you use grass?" was my logical question. Cloned meat isn't going to work well if the cells are eating cheap filler. Cloned meat should be glyphosate-free.

They did talk a bit about how the meat is grown in a sterile environment with a reduced chance of pathogens to sneak in. Mainstream meat production is sadly full of antibiotics.

The cost of the meat starts out at $17,000/lb. at the beginning of the film and falls to under $50/lb. at the end of the film. That does sound great. The final drop in price may be the most difficult step.

There are a couple of tastings in the film. You can taste through a film. The Beyond and Impossible non-meat products supposed taste like meat. Does the cloned meat taste like good meat or just meat? Did the taste improve between the first and second testing? We don't know.

BalanceofFood.com film coverage

Meat the Future is a good introduction to clean meat / cloned meat but doesn't cover the topic all that well. The person behind the meat is important but the meat is the future.

Meat the Future was scheduled to be a part of the 2020 Hot Docs Film Festival in Toronto. The film aired as part of Hot Docs at home on CBC television and the documentary Channel in Canada.

video and photos credit: Meat the Future film

Follow Me film is actually about addiction not weight loss

I've seen plenty of food and nutrition films. Weight loss films? Mostly TV shows not movies. Follow Me is a film that focused on long-term weight loss. What I learned from Follow Me had little to do with what they think the film was trying to say.

Tony Vassallo comes across as a nice guy. Vassallo tells us about how he lost 130 pounds in 2010 and maintained that weight loss. Vassallo is convinced we will be similarly inspired if we hear stories of long-term weight loss. Follow Me features 15 other people and their stories about long-term weight loss.

There are some major issues with Follow Me as a weight-loss documentary.

• You don't actually learn how they lost the weight. The testimonials are presented in an infomercial dynamic without the occasional interruptions featuring a toll-free number.
• These people were addicted to food. They substituted their addiction to food with another addiction. Great for you if you are, as Vassallo notes, "one percenters." One person in the documentary pointed out that they call us "one percenters" but anyone can do this. If you aren't one of the "one percenters," you have little to no chance of success.
• We see Vassallo about to dive into a healthy salad at a restaurant. He seems less than excited about what is in the salad. Vassallo isn't crazy about tofu but it is in the salad. I asked Vassallo in the Q&A about how the taste buds go from what he was eating before to that salad. He didn't give an answer that remotely fit the question. That may also be because he is a "one percenter."

Weight loss and addiction do sometimes come together in a Venn diagram but the addiction element can be exaggerated unless you are a "one percenter." You might think you're addicted to carbohydrates or sugar; chances are you aren't literally addicted.

That is the concern about Vassallo's concept. This sounds good to the average overweight person. Just will yourself to eat better and you'll eat better. If that works for you, but 99% of the people will fail.

There is a disconnect between most people and those people that always like kale and think kale is amazing. Their enthusiasm can rub off; you want to like kale as much as this person. Switching your taste buds is a positive step. Doing so with the enthusiasm of a Stepford cheerleader isn't realistic for the majority.

2019 WIFF Canadian films in review: Documentaries

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Vassallo figures that when we hear the stories of these 15 people, we'll be convinced that we can do the same weight loss and keep the weight off. The 16 stories, including Vassallo, are a small drop in even the "one percenters." The 16 anecdotal stories, vague as they are, delve very little in finding the secrets of long-term weight loss.

The film falls into the trap of an easy solution to weight loss. The true reality is that weight loss takes time and effort. One thing you learn from their stories is that they tried several times to maintain a long-term weight loss. You don't learn much from their stories. You would be better off watching a documentary on the mistakes people make in trying to lose weight. You can learn something from those people. One percenters? They don't have much to teach you unless you are one of them.

video credit: YouTube/Tony Vassallo
photo credit: Follow Me film

Buying truly natural food is the best way to avoid Monsanto GMOs

Separating Monsanto and glyphosate from the overall concept of genetic engineering, the fear against those GMOs has a lot to do with mistrust of the food system. The FDA standard of GRAS — generally regarded as safe — makes a lot of people feel unsafe.

A label on a Cargill ground beef package saying to cook the beef to at least 160°F. UHT pasteurization of milk, leaving us wondering how much nutrition remains in milk. And still a lot unknown about Monsanto and glyphosate 22 years into the process.

Some people have certainly taken advantage of people's fears to make money and to spread more fear. The forum that followed the Food Evolution film didn't really talk much about the film. The primary connection with the film focused on condescending views about economic incentives driving people to speak poorly about GMOs i.e., glyphosate. This ignores that Monsanto does the same thing.

Food Evolution has very little to justify the use of glyphosate. The forum wasn't that much better. They said that scientists spoke up initially about the positive nature of GMOs. I tend to believe them but those voices were pretty soft and didn't address Monsanto or glyphosate. When I asked at the forum about the advantages of Monsanto and glyphosate to the average consumer, the primary answer was the environmental impact of no-till agriculture.

The people who think the United States has the safest food supply are puzzled as to why people are concerned about the food they eat. Those who live in the United States who go to farmers markets and try to eat organic, or close to organic, are puzzled why their voices are buried in the avalanche that is the status quo.

Before the film and the forum, my hope was for a middle path, something between the extremes.

Film review: Food Evolution

Food Evolution tries to show us GMOs aren't all bad

Cook to 160°F minimum a sign to look elsewhere for meat

BalanceofFood.com film coverage

The concern over glyphosate is also tied to the concern over monocultures, big farms that produce massive manure runoffs that cause e-coli scares in vegetables as well as the Dead Zone in the Gulf of Mexico. Small farmers who use better growing techniques end up with better-tasting, more nutritious food for those who can afford to buy this food and have reasonably easy access.

Shopping at Wal-Mart is easier than going to Whole Foods. Rolling over and blindly buying food is simple. Turn off your brain and buy high-fructose corn syrup made from GMO corn. Farmers markets aren't as easy to random shop on a one-time basis; the benefits are greater if you go on a regular basis.

Do people who are conscious about their food do so to be liberal or pretentious? Do they work harder, read more food labels, spend more money and time to stand out in a crowd?

Grocery shopping is a lot easier in Europe. You do have to read some food labels but most food isn't hiding ingredients that are less than stellar. You do have to watch for UHT in Europe so buying milk requires a bit more thought. Then again, "food safety" people in the United States couldn't handle the idea of nonrefrigerated eggs and raw milk for sale.

"Furthermore, almost all of the foods currently produced using genetic engineering are useless at best and harmful at worst: 'GMOs' are mostly present in junk food, which you want to avoid anyway."

Mark Bittman and David L. Katz supplied that answer in a conversation about food and nutrition. The answer is simple: the more wholesome food you buy, the fewer labels you have to read. High-fructose corn syrup from GMO corn can't be found in products without labels.

Shopping on the outside edge of the grocery store still requires some thought, even without labels. "Natural" and "grass-finished" are very unhelpful terms in the meat department. You might buy organic apples but maybe not bananas.

The general consensus of eating as close to natural as one can is the overall best direction to head in established your own balance of food. The more truly natural you eat, the less GMOs (i.e., glyphosate) are a concern to your diet and health.

If you do spend more time at farmers markets this spring, ask them how they deal with their pests or what they feed their animals. If you don't normally spend time at a farmers market, learn what makes them different. Even if your proverbial shopping cart is mostly GMOs, see why people go to farmers markets. If you find yourself being anti-GMO, learn about genetic engineering outside of Monsanto and glyphosate.

The middle ground is not directly in the middle. Golden rice might make a world of difference in some parts of the world. You can be in favor of genetic engineering and still be concerned about glyphosate and Monsanto.

Film review: Food Evolution

"(Monsanto) should have been more transparent (about GMOs) in reaching the public." — Dr. Robert T. Fraley, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Monsanto.

This statement may win the "duh" award. Monsanto's actions have been a huge force behind people's concerns over genetically modified organisms (GMOs) since they came into force in 1996.

The primary purpose of the Food Evolution film is to make fun of those people who see GMOs as a threat and mocking them for not understanding the nuances of genetic engineering.

The film starts out with the story of the rainbow papaya in Hawaii. The rainbow papaya was nearly wiped out until scientists put a gene into the rainbow papaya and ended up saving the crop. The film notes that one Hawaii county voted to ban GMOs while leaving an exception for the rainbow papaya. The scientists in the film mock their ignorance over not seeing that GE and GMOs are the same technology.

Food Evolution talks about the advantages of genetic engineering such as golden rice, where Vitamin A is added to rice in areas that are deficient in that vitamin, a potential allergy-free peanut, disease-resistant crops, and drought-tolerant crops. The film also explores Uganda bananas with a similar concern as the rainbow papaya in Hawaii. The film puts the blame on anti-GMO proponents for why bananas can't be saved in Uganda.

The people behind Food Evolution don't understand the confusion behind genetic engineering as a concept but you don't have to read too much into the film to see there are some benefits to genetic modification of food. Neil Degrasse Tyson, who narrates this film, should make his own film about the science to help people understand the concept.

Food Evolution tries to show us GMOs aren't all bad

Michael Pollan and Marion Nestle are in this film. Their excerpts in the film make them look more like hostages reading off a script. The statements are brief and offer absolutely no context to anything else they might have said in the interview. Both Pollan and Nestle have complained about the editing of the film.

Director Scott Hamilton Kennedy employs a number of questionable edits and choices in the film to put opponents in bad light that make viewers uncomfortable, even if you are likely to agree on the subject.

The Washington Post science journalist Tamar Haspel is in the film. I don't always agree with Haspel but was curious to see where she was on the topic. Haspel tells us that "we make decisions based on our gut." Not very scientific. Haspel doesn't contribute anything of science in the film, an odd omission and a bit disappointing. Given that she has an opinion on most everything, viewers can infer that her answers didn't suit the message of the film.

Kennedy brushes off the story of Monsanto suing farmers over the patents of their seeds. He implies that this really comes down to one case in Canada and that farmer had a lot of Monsanto seeds that he just didn't want to pay for. A very simple Google search with legitimate news sources would tell you Monsanto has sued hundreds of farmers in the United States over the patents of seeds. One case involving Indiana soybean farmer Vernon Hugh Bowman went to the Supreme Court of the United States; Monsanto won that case. Again, the facts are easy to prove. So why lie about a small thing such as this?

The film spends a bit of time about a Gilles-Eric Seralini study on tumors in rats. The scientists blame GMO fears off this specific study. The scientists make a common mistake assuming regular people have a specific study as a reason for being concerned about GMOs. Maybe their concerns about the study are quite legitimate. The problem is that refuting one study or so-called expert doesn't win you an argument. 

Food Evolution goes after Dr. Oz a lot. A Venn diagram would find some common areas of those who question Dr. Oz and are anti-GMOs. The film goes out of its way to mock people such as Zen Honeycutt of Moms Across America, Jeffrey Smith, and the Food Babe.

The folks with March Against Myths challenge Honeycutt on the streets in downtown Chicago. The filmmakers think March Against Myths won the argument hands down, but the consensus is that neither side dealt well with their argument.

A primary argument against Moms Against America and the Food Babe revolve around products they sell on their Web sites. This is one of many moments in the film where the viewers would shrug and say "so what."

Mark Lynas is a food science journalist who switched from being anti-GMO to now being pro-GMO. Lynas apologized for vandalizing field trials of genetically engineered crops. He says in the film that if we were totally organic, we would have to get rid of the rainforest to feed the world's population. That last sentence seems more hyperbole than science not to mention that the rainforest is already being destroyed even with GMOs.

Food Evolution does reflect briefly on the dominance of Monsanto and other similar players with 90%-93% of GMO dominance of corn, soybeans, and cotton. You can like Monsanto and still be concerned about those statistics.

Fed Up speaks to limited truth along with whining and exploitation

Farmland is propaganda, but Katie Couric doesn't help Fed Up credibility

What's Tempting: GMO-free Cheerios

BalanceofFood.com film coverage

Food Evolution makes the argument that glyphosate is better than other pesticides. The film mentions that glyphosate has a LD50 mark of 5600 mg/kg, which by that measurement makes it less toxic than either caffeine or table salt. That sounds too impressive. But this is the only measurement that is in the film. 

The film spends about 2-3 minutes on organic farming. The talk is positive about organic but does point out that the "challenge is producing food on a large scale." This speaks to the theoretical advanced yields of GMOs, which relates back to the Lynas rainforest comment.

The film concludes with a debate from Intelligent Squared in New York City in late 2014. The question is over genetically modified food: yes or no.

Status	Agree	Disagree	Undecided
Before	32	30	38
After	60	31	9

Those numbers look really great for the pro-GMO side. The debate parallels the film in that the acceptance of genetic modification is an implied consent to glyphosate and Monsanto. You can watch the full debate and see for yourself.

The film runs a graphic about net sales of Whole Foods vs. Monsanto. The Whole Foods number is slightly higher. No context is given but the implied message is along the lines of Whole Foods is also a big scary corporation.

The companies are set up very differently. Whole Foods has to deal with brick-and-mortar locations, delivery issues, petty theft, and dealing with consumers. Monsanto and other similar players have a 90%-93% dominant market share where farmers are forced to buy their product every year. And the more resistant weeds are developed, the more Roundup has to be bought, increasing sales.

This "liberals are afraid of large corporations" argument is confusing at best. Apple Corporation is only one of many arguments against the concept. Liberals might be afraid of some large corporations but they are very afraid of Monsanto.

Nothing in this review or the film spells in a definitive manner whether glyphosate, Roundup, or Monsanto is beneficiary to the public. Food Evolution makes a good and fairly solid reasoning for exploring genetically modified food and the potential benefits. Past that, the film suffers from bad or awkward editing to make opponents look clueless and stupid. At other points, the film is plain dishonest.

Most films on food do promote organic and similarly grown methods. The difference with those films is that they are more positive about the attributes of their leanings and they want to inform those who do not believe instead of making fun of them. Food Evolution could use some of that etiquette and a lot nicer editing process.

The more knowledgeable you are about the food supply, the easier you can follow the truth and the hype in Food Evolution. But if you already are that smart about the food supply, chances are you won't learn much from the film.

video credit: YouTube/Abramorama Inc

Food Evolution tries to show us GMOs aren't all bad

I've seen a number of films that profess the wonders of growing organic. Being anti-GMO is part of the drill.

Food Evolution is a film that tells us GMOs are good. The truth lies somewhere in between but is that closer to this new film?

As part of a lunch-and-learn series this month, we will see the film broken up in 2 different sessions followed by a discussion on the topic.

The films I've seen want the truth. Food Evolution wants the truth. As we've learned about freedom on this food blog, truth seems to be in the eye of the beholder. While the definition of freedom will always have different hues, truth should be black and white.

There may be a section of anti-GMOs proponents who are also against genetic engineering of any kind. Most of the anti-GMO crowd can handle what happened to the rainbow papaya in Hawaii, where inserting genes from another plant helped bring back the plant to life. Given that GMOs work in a similar way to genetic engineering (GE), you might wonder about splitting hairs but this argument isn't as much about the technology but how that technology is being used. In other words, genetic engineering has some validity; Monsanto's use of said technology doesn't have validity.

Golden rice, adding beta-carotene (Vitamin A) to rice, as well as developing disease-resistant and drought-tolerant crops are examples of genetic engineering that have great potential, with the emphasis on potential to be a positive force in improving nutrition around the world.

'Fed Up' speaks to limited truth along with whining and exploitation

'Farmland' is propaganda, but Katie Couric doesn't help 'Fed Up' credibility

What's Tempting: GMO-free Cheerios

BalanceofFood.com film coverage

These films have a point of view. How that point of view is presented speaks volumes about their own case. If you have the truth on your side, using propaganda techniques doesn't help your cause. BalanceofFood is a journalism blog so we don't like propaganda even if we agree with the message.

We will have a review of the film later this month as well as a wrapup of the discussion early in April.

video credit: YouTube/Abramorama Inc

How to reduce hunger during a film festival

This is the film festival season for a lot of people. You can see several films in a row. You want to see more, but your stomach is growling.

Eating during films is obviously encouraged in North America. In Europe, not so much. Theatres don't allow outside food, and we are not asking you to go out of your way to break the rules.

If you decide to break the rules, here are some tips on the best ways to eat through a film festival.

• Crunchy is great but not in a dark theatre with a bunch of people who are not your friends. This eliminates some good foods such as carrot sticks and potato chips. The idea is to minimize noise in the theatre out of respect for your fellow patrons.
• Popcorn is a good sell and you can certainly find popcorn in any theatre. If you air pop your popcorn, you can fill a freezer bag full of popcorn. You aren't tempted to use almost butter-like substances to put on your popcorn. The freezer bag lets you limit your portion sizes.
• Protein bars are an easy solution. The concern is too much sugar. Almonds are a really nice protein option with protein and fiber. You shouldn't eat too many almonds, but that isn't usually a problem. Eating almonds gives you protein and fiber without sugar. You can enhance almonds with a chili lime mix of spices (or similar spice influence) if plain almonds don't have much appeal.
• Carrots are an ideal, yet loud, vegetable snack but there are vegetables that will make you more friends such as cucumbers. Cucumbers are big on water so they also serve to hydrate.
• Fruit works better when sliced before entering the theatre. Apples and pears are great for fall festivals since those fruits are in season. Grapes are ideal if they are seedless. No one wants to hear you spit seeds. Slice your own fruit for maximum freshness and flavor. Fruit provides good sugar and needed fiber to keep you going.
• Applesauce (ideally natural with no added sugar or high-fructose corn syrup) and yogurt require a spoon but are quite ways to pack in some calories.
• Homemade granola is an ideal snack since granola is designed to fill you up in between meals. Just be sure to limit the sugar and to avoid nuts that are too crunchy.
• If toaster pastries or other food that is wrapped, unwrap the items before entering the theatre. The crinkling of packaging is worse for your fellow filmgoers than loud crunching.
• Invest in snack size bags and sandwich size bags. They can regulate portion sizes and keep food fresh until you need to eat them.
• Drink water. Yes, you might make more trips to the restroom but water does fill people up.

If you aren't sure as to whether your food passes muster, here are a few basic questions:

• Does it smell? Would the smell offend you if this wasn't your food and you were on an airplane?
• Would the noise be enough to wake up your roommate or significant other?
• Would I eat this food in a library if they allowed food in a library?

The rules might shift a bit if you are attending a food film festival since you might be eating certain foods while the films are playing. Your fellow patrons are less likely to be offended because they will be eating the same food.

BalanceofFood.com film coverage

Be considerate of others. Pick a variety of foods that sustain you without too much added sugar or high-fructose corn syrup. Try to have some fun with your choices while maintaining some nutritional balance. And enjoy the films.

photo credit: The Food Film Festival

Fed Up speaks to limited truth along with whining and exploitation

In the course of covering food policy, we've seen a lot of films about improving the food supply or pointing out the faults of those who supply food. Most of the films fall into the category of helpful but naive.

To be clear, we enjoy these films. Seeing them every so often is a great reminder that we can and should do a better job with our food supply, especially in the United States.

In August 2014, we wrote about a pair of films that had the appearance of being noteworthy films but ran into a few problems. Farmland was released from Big Food and its praise, at least in my Facebook feed, looked to be misguided at best.

Fed Up had a more sincere purpose but had credibility issues with the significant presence of Katie Couric. We did something we rarely do on this blog: we came to conclusions based on not having seen the film. Our conclusions came from the trailer and information we read about the project. We hadn't seen the film.

The premise of Fed Up is rather good: the food industry tries to trick people into eating food based on questionable claims. This is not a shocker by any means. "The USDA is more about promoting U.S. food than about healthy food!?" Anyone who has seen any of these films know this to be true: this is literally not news.

How would the film deliver on this message and did the film actually meet the low standards we assigned to the film in August 2014?

We saw the film recently and can tell the whole story of Fed Up.

Farmland is propaganda, but Katie Couric doesn't help Fed Up credibility

BalanceofFood film coverage

The film goes back and forth between examples of the food industry's practices, strong political lobbying in Washington, and actual teenagers who are rather obese.

However, we never get a sense of the flow of the film. We know there are problems in companies and politics. We know that teenagers are becoming larger on average. There is no fluidity between any of the segments.

Couric's "journalism" sense is usually lazy, self-serving, and anti-Democratic Party. You can find TV journalists that are anti-Democratic Party and anti-Republican Party, but Couric never seems to understand what journalism actually does.

The film is obsessed over the McGovern Report from 1978 and how its findings were changed to satisfy the food industry. This is an actual theme of the film. The film never mentions Earl Butz, the Secretary of Agriculture under Richard M. Nixon, who started the growing policies that has led to cheap corn and high-fructose corn syrup.

Everything about the McGovern Report is likely true, but it's a tiny part of the story. Typical Couric journalism.

Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) is attacked in the film for supporting a frozen pizza manufacturer that supplies school lunches over the tomato paste being a vegetable issue. Again, everything in the situation is true, but a tiny part of the tomato paste story.

A bipartisan example is given that involved Sen. Larry Craig (R-ID) and Sen. John Breaux (D-LA). Mentioning a senator from each major party might technically be bipartisan, but Breaux was one of the more conservative Democratic senators at the time. Touting Craig is more hilarious, given how his Senate career ended.

Bill Clinton is in the film, and Couric asks him defensive questions that are very shallow and vague. Politicians of all stripes have certainly contributed to this mess. Watching Couric try to pin this on Clinton is rather hilarious. After all, the problem is very huge yet one person can turn things around. Barack Obama and Michelle Obama have done more than anyone else in power, though we can debate whether Michelle Obama has any real power, and look at the small impact they have had. Couric criticizes Michelle Obama for her actions in the film.

The film mentions the 6¢ increase in school lunches without pointing out that it was the first non-inflationary increase in school lunch funding since 1974. The film also doesn't point out that Republicans and conservative Democratic politicians watered down that increase to 6¢.

Blanche Lincoln, who worked hard to cut school lunch increase, lost her Senate race

Fed Up spends little time on high-fructose corn syrup even as it rails against the food industry. Dr. Robert Lustig is the expert used in the film to diminish the impact of high-fructose corn syrup, even if that contradicts his own findings. Michael Pollan gives the issue some serious attention but only for the few seconds he is on screen.

Enough about the politics: what about the children. We see the teenagers who are struggling with their weight, their home lives aren't helping as the problems are often generational. One kid talks about the Southern food heritage and how it can't be overcome.

One kid ends up getting lap band surgery since there are apparently no other options for this person.

Watching these kids in Fed Up is like the Sally Struthers commercials where people are starving except they leave out the part on how you can help. That is a serious problem with this film. We see things are bad but don't get a way to help the situation.

We watch as this young person gets lap band surgery but little about what happens after the surgery. Another kid loses some weight and gains it back again. Yes, this is reality but the film exploits these young people without making their segments meaningful.

Given the low expectations of this film, we were not surprised that the film was even worse than our expectations. If you woke up from a 40-year coma and wanted to learn about what has happened to the food supply, there are parts of the film where you will learn something.

For those in a serious fight to do something about the food supply, Fed Up is mostly whining, exploitation, and incomplete on a number of key subjects. We honestly feel bad for the other people who worked on this film; their talents would have been better off in a separate film where no one gave directions to Katie Couric.

video credit: YouTube/RADiUS

Slider Bites: MSNBC focuses on food waste

Food waste is as important as underreported. MSNBC took time this week to delve into this valuable topic on "Just Eat It: A Food Waste Story."

The news channel showed part of the documentary "Just Eat It." The documentary was introduced by celebrity chef Tom Colicchio, who is now MSNBC's food correspondent.

The documentary follows Jen Rustemeyer and Grant Baldwin as they attempt to go 6 months eating only the bounty of wasted food, though they could eat other food at friends and family.

When we don't hear from the couple, we get a lot about how grocery stores and restaurants want beautiful looking produce and perfectly good food is thrown out over vanity.

• What's Tempting: Ugly fruits and vegetables

Grant and Jen were concerned that they might not have enough food. They discovered that food abundance, especially in certain categories, was the issue.

After the documentary aired, Colcchio hosted a panel discussion (see video above). In the discussion, author Jonathan Bloom pointed out that Americans spend less on food than any other nation. If food were more expensive, we'd be less likely to waste it.

You can find more information about the special, click here. For more on the film itself, click here.

Hopefully, we will get more enlightening specials on food stories. Colicchio is a chef, not a journalist. We hope that between food and journalism, we will have more conversations on vital but underreported issues.

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We love the Daily Show's take on food and were glad to see Aasif Mandvi back doing a story on Simplot and GMOs.

We were simply puzzled by what aired. Mandvi found a guy who had some offbeat theories about GMOs. Those who are concerned about GMOs know there are some unconventional takes on anti-GMO theories.

The new GMO potato from Simplot was praised in the story. While the GM potato is different than the other GMOs, the paintbrush felt like GMOs were okay. We expect that from CNN, not the Daily Show.

Mandvi had a bad time with Simplot in an earlier story. Simplot would love this story.

Cornell University's Dr. Walter De Jong in the story plays an economist, saying the anti-GMO people have pushed regulation so that only large companies (e.g., Monsanto) can afford to do GMOs. He should stick to science.

The story wasn't particularly informative or funny.

The GMO potato might be okay. The issues with GMOs stem (pun intended) from use of insecticides, companies such as Monsanto, and a lack of independent information.

The Daily Show normally celebrates the idea of the more information, the better, and with humor. This story had none of those traits. If you watch and disagree, let us know in the comments section or on Twitter @balanceoffood.

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videos credit: MSNBC; Daily Show