[Scpg] Hopedance Media, Movie King Corn SB Public Library Faulkner Gallery Tues Nov 20, 6pm, Film &Dinner

[Santa Barbara Permaculture Network]

Hopedance Media Movie King Corn SB Public Library 
Downtown  Faulkner Gallery Tuesday Nov 20, 6pm


Tuesday, November 20 2007 6pm

Film & Dinner!

Brilliant, funny, exploring 2 young guys searching why they, and the
country, are "full of corn.” What happened and why? These two friends
set out to discover why by actually growing corn 
on an acre in Iowa to find out. Fascinating!

DiNNER with American Flatbread PiZZA and Sunstone Wine.

Where: Faulkner Gallery, SB Public Library
Suggested donation: $8-$10

REVIEW KING CORN  SUSTAINABLE TABLE WEBSITE

<http://www.kingcorn.net/about.html>
King Corn
<http://www.kingcorn.net/about.html>King Corn is 
a humorous and touching documentary about two 
best friends who decide to move to Iowa to grow 
an acre of corn – after finding out (through 
laboratory hair analysis) that their bodies were 
made primarily out of
.corn.  But this is not 
your typical buddy picture.  While it does trace 
a year in the life of two friends, the film is 
really about the history of corn in modern 
America and the filmmakers’ relationship with the 
crop they’ve decided to grow.

After the somewhat shocking discovery about their 
bodily composition, Ian Chaney and Curt Ellis 
move to a small county in Iowa (where, 
coincidentally, both had farmer 
great-grandfathers) in order to find out how they 
(and most other Americans) ended up made out of 
corn.  The two friends convince an Iowa farmer to 
lend them an acre of land to plant their corn 
crop.  They purchase genetically modified corn 
for planting, and with the help of their 
neighbors, some heavy machinery, and lots of 
chemical fertilizers and herbicides, they end up 
growing a bumper crop of corn.  But as Ian and 
Curt show us – this isn’t your sweet summer 
corn-on-the-cob we’re talking about – it’s corn 
bred specifically for industrial 
applications.  The two friends decide to find out 
what happens to the corn they’ve grown after it 
leaves the grain elevator – and find that tracing 
their crop is easier said than done.  Ultimately, 
however, they come to the conclusion that their 
corn is likely destined for one of two American 
industries: animal feed or corn syrup.

Diane Hatz interviewing Curt Ellis at Clear Creek Distillery
in Portland during the 
<http://www.sustainabletable.org/features/articles/kingcorn/../../../roadtrip>Eat 
Well Guided Tour.

Americans are so “corny” because almost every 
product in conventional grocery stores – from 
steaks to chicken breasts to condiments to 
desserts to tomato sauce to frozen entrees (the 
list goes on) are ultimately derived from corn, 
either in the form of high fructose corn syrup or 
from corn-based animal feed.  The filmmakers 
visit cattle feedlots which hold thousands of 
animals dining on corn-based feed and learn that 
too much corn causes the cattle to eventually 
develop an acidic condition in one of their 
stomachs (acidosis) that eventually kills 
them.  And after having trouble getting a tour of 
a high-fructose corn syrup factory, they decide 
to make corn syrup themselves (note: the process 
requires sulfuric acid and other industrial 
chemicals). Both corn-fed beef and high-fructose 
corn syrup contribute to the obesity epidemic in 
the United States. Nutritionists and others 
interviewed in the movie also discuss the link 
between the diabetes epidemic and high-fructose 
corn syrup (especially corn syrup consumed in the form of soda).
King Corn


The filmmakers trace the history of corn 
subsidies in the US – the current system started 
only about 30 years ago when the Farm Bill was 
changed and the emphasis was put on 
industrial-style monocropping.  The two friends 
lose money growing their acre of corn – the cost 
of seed, herbicides, chemical fertilizers, and 
equipment rental outweigh the price per bushel 
they get for their corn.  However, they get 
government subsidies for growing the corn which 
makes up for the initial input cost. The film 
gets to the heart of the matter by revealing the 
farmers’ frustrations. Many of them are 
multi-generation farmers caught up in the farm 
subsidy system. They realize that the current 
farm subsidies are part of an end to the more 
traditional farming of generations past, but 
can’t remove themselves from the system without losing their shirts.

The movie contains interviews with Michael Pollan 
(author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma) and several 
farmers in the Iowa town where Ian and Curt grow 
their corn. All-in-all, King Corn is a well-made, 
though provoking and sometimes humorous film about our modern food system.

For copies of the DVD and more information on the 
filmmakers’ odyssey into the world of corn, check 
out the King Corn www.kingcorn.net/ -


Read more about 
<http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/policy/>US 
agriculture policies, 
<http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/economics/>economics, 
<http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/feed/>animal 
feed, 
<http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/familyfarms/>family 
farms, and more on the Sustainable Table

http://www.sustainabletable.org/features/articles/kingcorn/


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