A ‘Fresh’ Look at Food Production

Given all the recent discussion on this blog about agriculture, horticulture, and sustainability, it seems fitting to recommend a little film that is touring the country right now: Fresh, a movie about sustainable agriculture. The movie stars people like Joel Salatin, who has become something of a farmer-celebrity since his appearance in The Omnivore’s Dilemma; Will Allen, an urban farmer from Milwaukee who recently won a MacArthur Foundation fellowship; and John E. Ikerd, a professor emeritus of agricultural economics at the University of Missouri at Columbia.

For those familiar with issues in sustainable agriculture, Fresh may not provide new information — these issues have been discussed widely in books by the likes of Wendell Berry, Wes Jackson, Barbara Kingsolver, Gary Paul Nabhan, and Michael Pollan, just to name some of the more popular authors. (Mr. Pollan is also featured in the film.) But as an introduction to the issues, Fresh is elegant and accessible, even occasionally humorous. Through juxtaposition of clips of industrial and sustainable farming, Fresh aims to both inspire and ignite. The clips of industrial chicken farming at the beginning of the film raised horrified gasps from the Washington audience.

Fresh does not yet have a distributor. Over the next two months, the movie will have one-night screenings in Denver, Kansas City, Minneapolis, Milwaukee, San Francisco, Seattle, and Vancouver, among other cities. The screenings will be followed by a panel discussion featuring people in the film and local-food advocates. More than 100 smaller, community-oriented screenings have also been set up. The filmmakers have a form on their site for setting up screenings.