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Robert Kenner

Robert Kenner cites the battle against Big Tobacco as proof that righteously indignant consumers can change the system.
Courtesy Magnolia Pictures

Robert Kenner isn't really a food guy, or at least he didn't start out that way. As he puts it, he's just a guy who makes movies.

Yet it has come to pass that Kenner, an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning director (TV's Two Days in October) who grew up favoring a diet of roast-beef sandwiches on rye, is traveling the country these days not only to promote his powerful new documentary Food, Inc., but also to discuss the state of the nation’s supermarkets, which are routinely stocked with genetically modified vegetables and chemically enhanced meats.

Farmer and author Joel Salatin emerges as an outspoken proponent of alternative farming practices in Food, Inc.
Photo Courtesy Magnolia Pictures

Now playing at the Embarcadero Center Cinema, one of the year’s most important films, Food, Inc., traces the industrial food revolution from its mid-20th century beginnings, when new, profoundly influential restaurant chains like McDonalds introduced the factory-inspired concept of line cooking in their kitchens, to the present, when supermarkets are routinely stocked with genetically engineered meats and vegetables.

06/03/095:47 pm

With food theory books and movies flooding shelves, it's no wonder that we don't look at food the way we once did. In Food, Inc., filmmaker Robert Kenner exposes the underbelly of the industry that has been hidden from the American consumer with the consent of our government's regulatory agencies, USDA and FDA. Sound familiar?

Daniels (with Graham) stars as a skeptical self-help author in the Sonoma Film Fest's winsome opener, The Answer Man.
Courtesy Maven Communications

The Sonoma International Film Festival kicks off tonight with the Northern California premiere of The Answer Man, a shrewdly amusing drama starring Jeff Daniels (The Lookout, Traitor) as the author of a spiritual self-help book.