Great job by these young filmmakers. Government subsidized farmers growing corn seed that's: fertilized with ammonia (yum); genetically modified to resist herbicides (slurp); fed to confined cattle until they're bloated and bursting at the seams, and almost dead with sickness, and combatively pumped up with antibiotics (tasty); made into high fructose corn syrup that's injected into virtually everything... and popped out as supersized empty calories in "Early Death Meals" at your local smiling Ronald McDonald franchise. Who's really the clown here? I was shocked to realize that the popcorn I was snacking on while watching this documentary was MADE OF CORN, TOO!! It's a conspiracy...

A very unpretentious and sincere look at corn. All aspects of corn, how it's everywhere in our food, whether as a primary ingredient or a source of food for a primary ingredient; why it's in our food - such as how subsedies influence what farmers may / may not grow, and whether it is good for us. It would have had more impact had subsidies on corn been compared to other possible, very popular crops like soy. Farming's a hard business and the role of the political system and it's impact on the food system cannot be viewed separately. Too bad they cut the scenes where they randomly offer corn to people on the street, that's funny. Good thing for extras (although the basement videos are kind of blah).

Corn. We can live with it, but we can't live without it.

We are made of corn. When Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis happened upon this astounding fact, they needed to know more: how does the corn get from the corn plant deep into the very molecular structures of our bodies? This became the motivation for their slightly tongue-in cheek documentary film of a road trip to the corn capitol of the U.S.-- Iowa. With many stops en route at McDonalds (almost everything on that menu is corn-based), Cheney and Ellis follow the corn trail from field to grain elevator to processor to feed lot to beef (and poultry) slaughterhouse to supermarket to our dinner table (or bag of take-out). You don’t eat meat, you say? Ah, but practically every aisle of the store is stocked with corn in its permutation as high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), so vegetarians are made of corn, too. Echoing other authors--Michael Pollan in The Omnivore’s Dilemma (394.12 Polla.M) and Eric Schlosser in Fast Food Nation (394.12 Schlo.E 2005)—albeit in a lighter tone, these young documentarians offer viewers an entertaining and enlightening 90 minutes. -Madame Librarian