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Our Daily Bread

EMAILPRINTFirst Run / Icarus Films

Our Daily Bread reviews
86
7.7 User Score:

Movie Info

Genre(s): Documentary  |  Foreign

Written by: Nikolaus Geyrhalter
Wolfgang Widerhofer

Directed by: Nikolaus Geyrhalter

Release Date:
Theatrical: November 24, 2006

Running Time: 92 minutes, Color

Origin: Germany / Austria

Summary

RATING: Not Rated

This documentary aims to show the industrial production of food as a reflection of our society's values: plenty of everything, made as quickly and as efficiently as modern technology permits. (First Run/Icarus)

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

Nikolaus Geyrhalter's superb documentary is an unblinking, often disturbing look at industrial food production from field to factory.

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100

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Despite this lack of narration, Our Daily Bread never fails to enthrall because of the impeccable eye -- for composition, for color, for movement within the frame -- of filmmaker Geyrhalter.

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91

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

What the activist drama "Fast Food Nation" does with talk and the aid of movie stars, Our Daily Bread, a riveting documentary by Austrian filmmaker Nikolaus Geyrhalter, does even better, with no voice-over and barely a word spoken by the unidentified workers involved in matter-of-fact killing and harvesting.

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88

Premiere Aaron Hillis

This critic found much to digest (pun barely intended), with thoughts of FDA politics and standard practices, the ritualism and sacrifice of our own species, why baby animals are considered protectable innocents (and inversely, grown steaks-to-be just a fact of life), plus, on a meta level, how people's dietary philosophies will inform their reactions to the work.

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83

Portland Oregonian Marc Mohan

Difficult to sit through, Our Daily Bread is nonetheless an important record, invaluable for those with the courage to watch it.

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80

The Hollywood Reporter Frank Scheck

An eye-opener that handles its themes in a refreshingly nonexploitative manner.

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80

Variety Leslie Felperin

Looks at the agricultural industry across Europe through sound and images alone. Pic offers a tabula rasa in which some auds will see a horrifying indictment of the industry's cruelties, others a realistic depiction of mechanized farming, and some a soft-spoken tribute to manual labor. Meanwhile, precisely composed lensing and painstaking sound design create moments of sublime beauty.

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75

New York Post V.A. Musetto

A thought-provoking documentary that would go well on a double bill with Richard Linklater's fictional "Fast Food Nation."

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75

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker

It's as much conceptual art as dispassionate survey of the bloodless assembly line nature of the modern food industry, all process and work, automation and repetition.

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67

The Onion (A.V. Club) Noel Murray

The non-sensationalized "this is what really happens" approach makes Our Daily Bread extra-creepy at times.

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What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this movie is 7.7 (out of 10) based on 9 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Poppy R. gave it a9:
A stark and meditative look at the industry of European food production. The pace of the film imitates the mechanistic, sterile, cold process the harvest has become in today's alienated world. The viewer is allowed ample opportunity to ponder the question: when living under a system that makes every head of lettuce, cow, or factory worker a mere example of their category of being, are there significant differences between these lives? When a life is predetermined in its totalized relationship to the whole of the system is the only remaining choice whether or not to take pleasure in the hypnotic rhythm of the well-oiled machinery? More documentaries should so simply inspire critical reflection on the status of modern living as this one does.

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