快餐国家

    具有现实意义的一部电影。
    看到bruce饰演的中间商和专程来做调查的公司高层明知汉堡里有屎，还是吃进嘴里，忽然发现现实生活中很多人都这样，欺骗自己之前，先让自己相信。
    在快餐店打工的女孩的叔叔对她说了这样一些话，那些感到快乐的人，往往是努力去实行自己理想的人，即使是那些最后并没有实现理想的人。
    人为什么而活？为了和大多数人一样，人云亦云，每天都重复昨天的狗屎一样的生活？还是要活得真实？问问自己吧。

最初看到这个电影名字，以为是类似《Supersize Me》这样的记录片，结果是又不是，说是因为片里有大段特别写实的屠宰，切割，冲洗的镜头，包括对相关的成员的采访，说不是因为电影又巧妙地将三段故事平行穿插在里面。
没想到酷似“剃刀”（尤其是那双漂亮的眼睛）的那个女生最终选择了放弃工作而加入到激进的学生团体中，（虽然之前有她对舅舅回忆年轻时参加抗议时流露出的崇拜之情可以推断）几个学生之间的讨论也和《The Edukators》里的台词一般精彩，虽然最后的行动失败了（那些牛不肯跑也是很值得玩味的地方），也许就算行动成功恐怕还是不会有什么实际效果吧。每次一看到这种大机器场面的机房就有点发怵，结果果然还是有人被误卷进去一条腿血淋淋的，让人想起《The Machinist》里那个工人手被卷掉的场面。
当电影里非常记实地展现出真实的屠宰牛的画面时，忍不住就想到时髦小年轻们坐在明亮的快餐店里笑声唤语，可最后我们看完这个电影感慨归感慨，下次和朋友在外面逛街累了选歇脚的地方可能还是会去麦当劳，就算不去麦当劳去肯德基其实还是一回事。
片尾响起沉重苍凉的后摇音乐，很符合结尾时的无奈悲凉氛围，但随着最终结局（被称之为“有正义感”的那个高层主管最终的妥协）的结束却突然转变为欢快却冰冷的电子音乐，实在是莫大的讽刺啊，也不禁要为这部电影的配乐击掌喝彩。一直等到最后才看到原来那段后摇应该是来自Friends Of Dean Martinez，我曾经在“最喜欢的一些纯器乐”里还选过他们的一首作品，看来把他们的作品来配这种同样有点沉重调子的电影的确再合适不过了。
 里面有一个非常漂亮的金发女生起初第一眼就觉得很熟悉，结果没想到是Avril Lavigne，不过电影里似乎到没她的歌曲做配乐。
如果说《The Edukators》是我在2005年（电影却拍摄于2004年）里看到最激动人心的作品，那么这部《Fast Food Nation》应该是我在2007年上半年一开始看到最让人反思的作品（电影前一年上映却同样是在次年看到）。

在短短的90分钟里围绕一个主线描述多个线索,这部片子干得不错.
偷渡的墨西哥人,供应快餐肉的加工厂,检查工作的快餐营销副总裁,在快餐店里兼职的大学生...
原来还以为有个爆发式的冲突,其实没有.影片就是用几个典型的浓缩的生活描述来表现主旨,平铺直叙,彼此关联,表现真实,确实能激发观众的思索,并不仅仅是快餐食品的卫生问题.现在仔细想想,似乎并非一个主题,表现的东西很多,就看观众会往哪方面思考.

看到布鲁斯威利了,简直不敢相信自己的眼睛,还以为只能在动作片里看到他.

One can tell that the script of this movie came from a non-fiction work: there is really no narrative here, at all! Therefore no characterization and no drama.

This is nothing but a straight propaganda film: cardboard characters, wooden performance, implausible conversation, and dogmatic literalness of every single detail serving nothing but the main theme: Fast Food Is Shit; People in Fast Food Business Are Shitty People. Right; like I need to spend two hours watching a bad movie to get THAT in my head!

The real shocker is who made this movie: Richard Linklater, the same director who made "Before Sunset/Sunrise", and "Slackers"! Where is the humorous humanism that many have come to associate with Linklater's name? Where is that great craftsman who can conjure a coherent narrative out of so many threads of digressions?

The film's about a fast food chain "MICKEYS"( sounds sooo familiar and thus make me uncomfortable), three stories crammed together telling a series of secrets behind the fast-food mogul---mickey's(I thought it's insinuating Macdonald's/KFC/PaPa Jones etc.), revealing many social problems as well as urging the audience to give them some thoughts.

Don Henderson, a marketing Vice president at Mickey's , an upright and honest guy, was appointed to investigate why the fecal coliform counts of their burgers were off the charts, so he went on a business trip to Colorado. He found out sth wrong, as I expected, and he's rather worried about the bad situation he's faced with: yes there's problems with the suppliers, there's numerous ugly truths in front of him, but the thing is, everything's in a mess, if he did sth to make a difference, he would definitely suffer GREAT LOSS. The excutives's main task is to make profit out of business, while set aside some time to fight for power, fame , wealth...whatever. Everyone seemed to take this for granted, and Don didn't have that much guts to break the balance while the chance of winning the battle is rahter slim.

Meanwhile another story line began with a group of illegla Mexican workers who were really poor and intended to seek their fortunes in the United States. A girl named COCO was made to sleep with her supervisor; CoCo's good friend Sylvia's husband was hurt in the slaughter house and she's no choice but to work in that gruesome place to earn a living; many Mexican workers use drugs cuz the job's too demanding & tiring. The stories about these people are totally tragical especially the scenes towards the end: Sylvia was shown around her work place and you could see how disgusting the process of killing cows.

The third storyline is about "Amber" , a girl worked in Mickey's delivering food to customers with broad simles. She's my favorite character in this movie. Definitely not a silver-spoon-born girl, dreaming of go to college and become an astronaut, bright, upright, and YOUNG. I like the scenes about her tackling with family members, the dialogues, the expressions...all things tells what a girl Amber is. When she got to know more about the bad side of Mickeys, she was conscience-striken and quit the job, joining a group of young people to contrive an environmantal protection plan. BTW, Avril Lavigne was among these teenagers.

This is a big surprise for me, anyway, it's worth watching. I heard that Disney stop the companionship with Macdonald's, it is not until today when I watched this film did I realize how wise this desicion is!

根据2001年出版的同名畅销纪实作品改编，理查德·林克莱特这次没有在电影里不厌其烦的絮絮叨叨，而是通过几个相互勾连着的简单故事抖搂了快餐产业链背后的黑暗。其实对于中国观众来说也算不上有多黑暗：快餐店的服务员会向看着不顺眼的顾客快餐中“加料”，不是那么地讲究卫生；加工厂为节约成本雇用非法偷渡者作为工人，员工没经过什么培训，拿着每小时8美元的低工资，经常会有伤残意外发生。由于机械自动化的发展，屠宰牛的速度比以前提高了2-3倍。牛也从放养到了大规模圈养，大量的小农场主被迫破产或离开此行业。为了压低成本，饲料也会做很多调整，牛吃牛当然会吃出疯牛病。片尾屠宰场内的景象非常震撼。