Though this French documentary may recap a lot of information already familiar to people concerned about the growing impact of genetically modified foods, The World According to Monsanto is certainly novel for director Marie-Monique Robin’s choice of framing device: shots of her at the computer doing Google searches on her movie’s topics. Are we to presume that documentary films are now researched with the same degree of rigour we expect from high school science papers?

While Robin’s film is further hampered by clumsy English-language narration, it does contain more effective segments that detail the American agricultural corporation’s efforts to exert its influence over global food production. Monsanto’s tactics range from twisting rubber arms at the US Food and Drug Administration, suing farmers who violate its new seed patents and smearing scientists whose findings may be contrary to its own often suspect data on its products’ impact on our planet’s collective gene pool — the ramifications for American milk, Mexican corn and Indian cotton are particularly alarming. The strong-arm nature of Robin’s own strategies may not result in great filmmaking but her movie will get you thinking seriously about what’s on the end of your fork.

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