by JOHN CUSTODIO

Nikolaus Geyrhalter thinks we know too little about the food we eat and how it gets to our tables, so he’s made a film to show us, amongst other things, how tomatoes are picked, how chicks are hatched and how salt is mined. He also shows us how animals are raised and slaughtered. Yet despite its unappetizing aspects, Our Daily Bread is a fascinating film, not least of all because it’s the last thing you’d expect in a tell-all documentary about automated food production.

The film tells nothing, but shows everything: There is no narration, no dialogue, no talking-head interviews, just image after compelling sci-fi image culled from the world of high-tech agriculture and animal husbandry. Who knew, for example, that there’s a machine made especially for shaking olives off of their trees, another for picking them up off the ground? Or that vacuums are used to suction chickens off of coop floors and into cages? Or that a cow can be skinned in under 10 seconds?

Visual surprises like these are not all that Our Daily Bread has to offer. Unlike other non-verbal “docs”—Baraka and the ’Qatsi trilogy, to pick the most obvious examples—Geyrhalter’s film doesn’t use a musical soundtrack to cue our emotions. The awe, dread and occasional boredom we experience watching it is underscored not by Philip Glass compositions, but by the whirring, banging and droning of machines, the monotonous white noise of grow lights and the barely audible chatter of alienated assembly-line workers.

These are inspired directorial gambits, but they have their drawbacks. For example, given viewers’ genre expectations, especially as they’ve been shaped recently by blockbusters like Fahrenheit 911 and Super Size Me, it’s fair to ask if the film really qualifies as a documentary. If so, what story is it telling? What, if anything, is it advocating?

Given its sumptuous static shots and rhythmic editing, Our Daily Bread could just as easily be seen as experimental art cinema. For that matter, a slight shift in context is all it would take for the film to be used to promote the very practices it supposedly condemns. Kraft, Monsanto or a government proud of its agricultural economy could all spin this film easily enough to their purpose. That’s the problem with cleaving so closely to a policy of non-committal documentation: to leave a slate blank is to invite all and sundry to fill it in however they like.

Spurning spoon-feeding

But Geyrhalter insists the risk was worth taking. He specifically eschewed Michael Moore’s methods, the political gains of which, he claims, are lost as easily as they are won. “I didn’t want to spoon-feed audiences,” he says. “I wanted them to work a little bit, to come to their own conclusions about what they were seeing.”

Most viewers, and certainly most critics, have tended to see in Our Daily Bread only the condemnation side of the equation. The New York Times called it a “devastating” revelation of the “barbarism of factory farming.” The Amsterdam International Documentary Festival, in awarding the film its Special Jury Prize, called it “a vision of hell.” And animal rights groups and organic food activists in Europe are championing the film as an important breakthrough.

“What’s interesting about that,” Geyrhalter hastens to add, “is that the first few times we screened these films, we invited everybody—activist groups but also the people from these large companies. Both sides agreed: the film was accurate. What I showed was true. That was important to me, because I didn’t want to betray anyone’s trust, especially those companies that gave me access to their factories and farms.”

Still, when pressed, Geyrhalter admits the film does advance a political agenda—“It’s clearly there. You just have to read between the lines.”—but he insists that he didn’t embark on the project with one in mind. “I was just curious, you know? How can you not be, when you go to a supermarket and it’s all there for you, so easily accessible. Our grandparents used to spend 30 per cent of what they earned on food. We spend eight. How is that possible?”

Geyrhalter may be like that guy—we all know one—who’s worked in too many restaurant kitchens and suffers from a need to share with you all the unsavoury details of what he’s witnessed. Except for this one important difference: Geyrhalter doesn’t take delight in disgusting us, nor does he try to rouse our indignation. Instead, slyly and with zero affect he asks in the most matter-of-fact way, “Can you live with this? Fine. But at the very least you should know.”

Our Daily Bread premieres Wednesday, Nov. 19 at the Rencontres Internationales du Documentaire de Montréal. Info: www.ridm.qc.ca

Fascism and forgiveness

>> Once a Nazi... tells the story of a Concordia prof and his Nazi past

by MATTHEW HAYS

Frederic Bohbot says it was an odd place to hear a confession. It was 1997, and Bohbot was then completing an undergraduate degree in communication studies and political science at Concordia University.

One of his favourite professors, Adalbert Lallier, was teaching a class in international relations. Bohbot says he was a likable prof who constantly challenged his students to think independently. Then Lallier made a stunning admission, announcing to the class that he had once served in the Waffen S.S., the elite Nazi police force. He had also witnessed the gunning down of seven Jews in the final years of the war. Like many at the time, he did nothing.

Lallier told the class they could take time to consider whether or not they would want him to continue teaching the class. He would leave the room, allow them to vote on the matter, and he would accept their verdict. “I was just shocked,” says Bohbot today. “It was the last thing I would expect.” The class of 60-odd students would vote overwhelmingly to keep Lallier on.

But the revelation Lallier made was more contentious outside of the classroom. There was, understandably, a degree of furore over the admission. And the whole situation haunted Bohbot, so much so that he has turned Lallier’s incredible story into the documentary film Once a Nazi…, screening at this year’s Rencontres internationales du documentaire de Montréal.

That feeling, Bohbot recalls, would continue to follow him, as Lallier’s amazing confession continued to have ramifications. Lallier would travel to Berlin, where he would make crucial testimony in the conviction of an octogenarian war criminal.

The strange case of Lallier raised a series of troubling questions for Bohbot, himself Jewish: Can we forgive? Do we have the right to forgive? Can people rehabilitate themselves after being a part of something so horrific?

Critics and contradictions

The questions are not easily answered, and one of the strengths of Bohbot and producer Evan Beloff’s film is to carry us through the dizzying contradictions. “Every time I interviewed someone, I was left with a different impression,” Bohbot recalls of the filmmaking process. “I would talk to Lallier and feel as though he was being honest. But then I would talk with his critics and feel as though he had just managed to be very persuasive.”

Lallier had critics—as would be expected—but one of the incredible wrinkles in this tale is that many of those who rallied behind him were prominent members of the Jewish community. Montreal Rabbi Reuben Poupko and Nazi hunter Steven Rambam both praise the fact that Lallier came forward and take him on his word when he says he is remorseful. The film even includes the testimony of one Holocaust survivor, who says Lallier is okay.

Needless to say, some of the public screenings of this film have been followed by heated question-and-answer sessions. “Some are furious with him, feeling he is not someone to be forgiven,” says Bohbot. “But after one screening, a Holocaust survivor came up to me and said that he would be willing to shake Lallier’s hand. He said he didn’t want to befriend him or anything, but he said he didn’t have anything against him. This film draws on a lot of emotions.”

And Bohbot’s own verdict? “It was tough—as I made the film, my feelings went back and forth. But I’d have to say now that while I don’t respect what he did all those years ago, I think he has worked to make amends.

“He taught English and French to Hasidic schools in the ’70s. He was an exceptional teacher, always taking great care with his students and showing intense interest in what we were doing. He was always willing to meet with people outside of class. He really tried his best to make up for all that happened.”

Lallier has since left his teaching post at Concordia and now lives outside of the city. “He didn’t really understand why we wanted to make this film,” Bohbot says. “But he did cooperate with us when we asked.”

Once a Nazi… screens on Thursday, Nov. 16, 9 P.M., at the NFB Cinema (1564 St-Denis), and Saturday, Nov. 18, 5:10 p.m., at the Cinémathèque Québécoise (335 de Maisonneuve E.). For more info see www.ridm.qc.ca

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