silvergirl-11779 I saw this movie a few months back and recently referred a friend who is struggling with health and weight issues. I feel this movie is an excellent primer for those who either have little concept of what comprises nutrition, or for those who need a reminder. I agree with some of the reviewers that there is an over- emphasis on juicing, but I don't feel that this is the real focus of the movie, rather, to shift your food intake from processed foods to foods that you prepare at home, processed or not. Really, if you look at popular food movements over the past several years, Paleo, 21 day fix etc, they focus on lean meats, healthy fruits and veggies, good fats. Perhaps they go about it differently, but the message is largely the same, which it should be. Long term health comes to 1% of us by luck, and 99% of us by working at it through mechanisms that have been evolutionary programmed. Eat right and exercise. Period. Are the 'experts' interviewed Nobel-prize winning researchers in the field of physiology and nutrition? No. However, they have devoted considerable time and effort, if not their career and personal well being into familiarizing themselves with the topic. I have a Doctorate in Medicine and don't discount any information given to me based solely on the lack of degree credentials following a name. Regarding the food industry's 'plot' to make us fat..no real smoking gun there. I understand this part of the plot as a cautionary tale about profit margins, bringing back returning customers (food addicts) and bottom lines, not about a larger collusion amongst Kraft, General Mills etc to make America fat. My father is a retired food scientist for a major American food company. A food scientist's job is to engineer the product to make it taste better, give it better 'mouth feel', last longer on the shelves, all the while fulfilling the whim of the market. What that has translated to over the past few decades changes...remember Crisco and Margarine being touted as the healthy answer to butter? Ha. We are programmed by design to gravitate towards foods which are high in sugar, fat, and to some degree salt. The fat free craze of the 80's and 90's gave us a whole host of processed food items which did nothing in the long run for our health and left us wishing for more. I was able to experience this first hand at home, 'behind the curtain' seeing the scientific aspect of food manipulation. I think the movie does a great job of initiating a dialogue and exploring the complex venn diagram intersection of anthropology, economics, and physiology. In a sense, profits from the food industry paid for my parent's salary, which helped pay for my college, and opened a door to me for medical school (which I paid for myself). Now I tell people to avoid eating the very foods which made my education possible. If you're looking to this light documentary movie for a new magic bullet for weight loss, you've come to the wrong place. There is no magic bullet (not even juicing, ha). But, understanding the roots of your eating behavior will help you disengage from 1) a blame game and 2) may help you format a path for change.

Marie Lou Hungry for Change is a documentary that denounces the Food & Beverage industry, holding it largely responsible for obesity and consequential unhealthiness in the US. It condemns the dieting industry for maintaining the status quo while disguised as a cure.So, how do you lose weight, regain energy and treat any associated illnesses? Hungry for Change promotes the consumption of natural whole foods as the only real solution. The film is not too loaded or soppy (my main complaint with these types of documentaries), and extremely interesting.This film won't come as a revelation for those who are already nutrition-conscious, but it's a great reminder not to fall for that refreshing diet soda anytime soon. I highly recommend the watch to those who have a desire to lose weight and have tried every fad diet without success, for those who feel plain unhealthy and need a change.For a more in-depth summary, check out my article on www.omalou.com!

ghsciguy-603-20027 **** There may be information in this review that would spoil this film ****Let's be honest, anyone with enough of an interest in a subject to make a movie about it is going to have a pretty biased viewpoint. I have seen a number of "food" documentaries that are filled with half-truths, stories, or misinformation. This film struck me as far more balanced, logical and fair than others I have seen.Yes, they strike the conspiracy bell about corporate food giants stamping out artificial food products laced with chemicals to addict us and deteriorate our health. While I do not buy that proposition that there is an evil conspiracy, it cannot be denied that many of our foods have chemicals that are not normally present in natural foods. It would also be fairly difficult to argue that eating processed foods is BETTER than eating natural foods.The main thesis seems to be junk food is full of chemicals that provide very little nutrient value so you eat a lot and get fat. Natural foods are more nutrient rich and you eat less. Their thesis is backed up with anecdotes, studies, and frankly, common sense.Towards the end, they do enthusiastically endorse juicing as one method of changing your dietary habits. Most intelligent people have the ability to see past this and get the overall message of health and wellness by consuming natural foods.This film has legitimate advice about improving health. I'm not sure why other reviewers have tried to subvert that message by offering their own health advice (some of which is obviously misguided -- like the person confusing guanine and glutamate) I suppose some people feel more important if they try to tear this film down?

melinda2001 Two stars for some good basic information in the beginning, zero for the rest. Truthfully I didn't even get to the part about juicing. My BS meter also went off in the middle part about the dangers of MSG so I just stopped and did some digging. The only thing I have to add to the conversation is the result of my brush-up on that topic. I'm glad that I did because I had always heard that MSG is bad but didn't know any details. I thought it was a sort of super-salt. In fact it *is* a salt. It's the sodium salt of glutamate. (Thanks to kmtroy for pointing out it's not the same as guanine.) Turns out that compared with table salt it's basically benign. Both are flavor enhancers. The main difference is that the LD50 of MSG is five times that of table salt which means that it takes five times as much MSG to kill a rat than table salt.What surprised me was both the absurd amounts they gave to baby mice. My back-of-the-envelope guestimate says it would be roughly the same as injecting a 150 pound person with almost half a pound of MSG. Imagine being injected with half a pound of table salt! This does seem to cause a lot of obesity in mice so there is a grain of truth there. I'm just surprised those doses didn't kill all of them.Studies on people don't seem to indicate any real problems with the stuff. (Might it have something to do with the crappy foods that get loaded up with MSG? Nah.) Double blind tests on people taking capsules of the stuff didn't show any problems. The part I liked best was one study where one participant who self-described as being highly sensitive to MSG handled it just fine but claimed a reaction to the placebo.Watch out too about Jon Gabriel, the guy trying to paint MSG as poison. Turns out he's not any sort of scientist. He's just a guy out there selling yet another diet book. So I'm not surprised to hear that the movie ends as an infomercial for a juicer. Personally, I'd rather eat all the healthy fruit and stuff than drink their juice. I'm definitely glad that I learned to not fear MSG.