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Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price
Cinema Libre Studio

Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price reviews


7.4

based on 18 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 7 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

FILM:

MPAA RATING: Not Rated

Robert Greenwald's documentary WAL-MART: The High Cost of Low Price takes you behind the glitz and into the real lives of workers and their families, business owners and their communities, in an extraordinary journey that will challenge the way you think, feel... and shop. (Brave New Films)

GENRE(S):	Documentary
DIRECTED BY:	Robert Greenwald
RELEASE DATE:	Theatrical: November 4, 2005
RUNNING TIME:	95 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

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...

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Greenwald floats the vital issue of whether Wal-Mart should be restrained by antimonopoly regulations, but his real question is cultural: Even with its rock-bottom prices, is Wal-Mart in the best interest of American consumers?

Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir

The cut-rate colossus didn't just ride the tide that sucked industrial jobs out of our towns and cities and spat out low-wage service-sector jobs in the sprawling exurbs -- it helped create it, and at the very least drastically accelerated it.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Important, awareness-building documentary.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

The movie's masterstroke is to avoid interviewing the usual anti-globalist suspects and let solid, hard-working middle Americans speak.

The New York Times Anita Gates

Makes its case with breathtaking force.

The New Yorker David Denby

For all its missteps, the movie powerfully suggests that Wal-Mart is capable of demoralizing a community so thoroughly that it doesn't have the spirit to carry on its life outside the big box.

San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub

Compelling and frequently entertaining.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

Left-wing flame-thrower Robert Greenwald (Uncovered: The War on Iraq) gets after the global giant anyway, and he may have you thinking twice before entering another Wal-Mart parking lot.

LA Weekly Ernest Hardy

The list of ills is endless, well-researched, and cross-referenced repeatedly for emphasis. That makes the film a bit of a slog at times, but the fury and grief of the folks interviewed propel it forward.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

An engrossing, muckraking documentary about the retail giant that's been called "the world's largest, richest and probably meanest corporation." But if you're expecting an angry diatribe, you're going to be disappointed.

Dallas Observer Melissa Levine

An affecting piece of work.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

It's not a question of agreeing or disagreeing with this film's point of view to say that it isn't as often convincing as it is convinced.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

While the film is obviously meant as a call to arms, the very single-mindedness of the approach could work against it.

The Hollywood Reporter Frank Scheck

Lacks the cinematic panache to elevate it above the level of agitprop. But its all too relevant dissection of its subject is well worth paying attention to.

Empire David Hughes

With more thorough editing this could have been on a par with Greenwald's previous films. His source material is gripping, but not life-changing.

Variety John Anderson

For all the film's provocations and documentation, however, Greenwald never seems get to the heart of the matter: that it is the consumer who makes Wal-Mart powerful.

Village Voice James Crawford

Viewers may not be surprised to learn of Wal-Mart's horrific track record, but they can't deny Greenwald's airtight advocacy.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Wal-Mart's home office in Bentonville, Ark., can rest easy: Greenwald, as usual, is hysterically preaching to the choir.

The average user rating for this movie is 7.4 (out of 10) based on 7 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Big Timer gave it a10:
Excellent insight into powerful corporation that doesn't understand or want to understand "social responsibility" or how to take care of their own.

John Boy gave it a6:
The film ends with a strange self-absorved thud of idolatry for the cause. Its use of music was excessively manipulative and unnecessarily so. I have to feel that an opportunity was wasted and that, in the end, the good that this film could've done would be erased by its senseless execution of not letting the story speak for itself. I gave it a 7 because I know what Wal-Mart is about and they've presented a rather damning argument despite its poor sense of what makes a quality documentary.

Neema S gave it a2:
Where's the comparisons to other companies? Where's the focus on the consumers that save thousands of dollars each year? Where's the employees who couldn't get jobs elsewhere? This is a classic mockumentary: political advertisement disguised as real film.

James B. gave it a9:
This is a documentary that sheds light on the many things that we already suspected about the retail giant. I wasn't taken in by every aspect of the movie, such as the "poor little employee" stance against the big-bad employer....but at the end of the day (and the end of the movie), it was quite enlightening. Pay close attention to some of the statistics, according to the film, such as the Walton family (worth 102 billion dollars) donating less than 1% of their worth to charity as compared to Bill Gates' 58%. The film claims that there is nearly 27,000,000 sq. ft. of empty Wal-Marts sitting around the country collecting dust. You will not feel that you have wasted your time by watching this film. On the other hand, if your interests are confined to buying cheap stuff cheap, and you don’t care at all what becomes of your community, it may not be worth the small investment to purchase this DVD.

nate p. gave it a5:
Wow what can i say.... i hated this movie. i might as well go to a trailer park and just scream wal mart sucks, youd get more of a response.

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Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price Cinema Libre Studio

Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price
Cinema Libre Studio