If you enjoyed the Future of Food video I posted earlier this year, you'll want to invest an hour watching this in-depth interview conducted by the Massachusetts School of Law with director Deborah Koons Garcia about her alarming and enlightening 2004 documentary.
Garcia's interest in the science behind food and how it could be manipulated started very early as a teenager experimenting on mutating seeds and plants with radiation and chemicals. Back then, there was no problem comparing untainted plants with mutated ones, Garcia says, as the latter were thicker, bigger and more deformed.
That long ago experiment Garcia conducted made such a profound impression, she maintained her keen interest in agriculture -- opting then for organic foods over conventionally grown ones -- even as she studied filmmaking at the University of North Carolina.
Originally, the film was going to be about pesticides, until it took a completely different and important direction based on a tip from a fellow filmmaker and farmer about the blight of genetically modified (GM) foods, a crisis in the making about which many Americans are lukewarm, at best.