Fast Food NationMovie Reviews

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Avg. Critic Score: 64 out of 100 Generally favorable reviews Metascore^® based on all critic reviews

Information for Parents:

Iffy for 15+

Read Common Sense Media review

Critic scores range from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating more favorable reviews.

100

Boston Globe | Wesley Morris
Fast Food Nation has the dramatic flatness and willful lack of personality of some documentaries -- or at least how Linklater thinks a documentary should be. The movie nonetheless feels like both a work of investigative journalism and an immense human-interest story, veering into muckraking, horror, teen comedy, and what passes for "Twilight Zone" science fiction. Read full review
83

Entertainment Weekly | Lisa Schwarzbaum
Naturally, a subject this right-on draws a right-on cast. Kris Kristofferson, Avril Lavigne, and Ethan Hawke pitch in. Read full review
80

The New York Times | A.O. Scott
It's a mirror and a portrait, and a movie as necessary and nourishing as your next meal. Read full review
80

Los Angeles Times | Carina Chocano
If Linklater regards the fake culture that has replaced real places with horror, he has nothing but respect and affection for his characters, and the movie is rescued from nihilism by his humanistic view. Read full review
75

Philadelphia Inquirer | Steven Rea
Fast Food Nation picks up, and drops off, various members of its cast, sometimes without a satisfying resolution. But its final scenes, inside a real working meatpacking plant, on the killing floor, are brutally to the point. Read full review
75

Rolling Stone | Peter Travers
It's less an expose of junk-food culture than a human drama, sprinkled with sly, provoking wit, about how that culture defines how we live. Read full review
70

Variety | Todd McCarthy
Richard Linklater's rough-hewn tapestry of assorted lives that feed off of and into the American meat industry is both rangy and mangy; it remains appealing for its subversive motives and revelations even as one wishes its knife would have been sharper. Read full review
60

Washington Post | Stephen Hunter
Works far better as journalism than as drama. One weakness is that poor Linklater has to keep bringing in guest explainers, who lay out one policy or another but have nothing whatsoever to do with the story. Read full review
50

San Francisco Chronicle | Ruthe Stein
For all the filmmaker's good intentions, Fast Food Nation isn't a particularly good movie. It doesn't hold together or grip you the way a documentary might have. Read full review
50

The Hollywood Reporter | Kirk Honeycutt
Following up on Morgan Spurlock's wildly successful indie film "Super Size Me," critics of fast food were hoping that a one-two punch would further raise consciousness among consumers and purveyors alike. Alas, Fast Food Nation is punchless. Read full review

Metacritic link View more reviews for Fast Food Nation on Metacritic

Information for Parents

Common Sense Media says Iffy for 15+ Bloody exposé; not for kids. Want fries with that?

What Parents Need to Know Parents need to know that most kids probably won't be that interested in this exposé of the fast food industry (which is based on Eric Schlosser's non-fiction best-seller). And just as well. It includes an extremely graphic sequence on the "killing floor" of a meat-packing plant, which shows actual footage of brutal hacking at cattle. Other violence includes the difficult border crossing endured by Mexican workers and a bloody scene of a worker's leg getting caught and cut off in a grinding machine. Some sex scenes between a manager (who trades sex for favors at work) and his female workers show naked body parts. Characters drink, smoke marijuana, and take methamphetamines. Language includes some 20 uses of "f--k" and a variety of other curses.

Families can talk about the ethics of producing fast food. Why do the producers sacrifice quality to save money? What is a corporation's responsibility in protecting its workers? How honest do corporations that produce food need to be? Should they disclose errors and regularly occurring contaminations? How does this movie show connections between the corruption that runs throughout the company's hierarchy (from floor workers to managers to marketers to executives)? Do you think this drama -- which is based on a non-fiction book -- is more effective than a documentary on the same topic would have been? Why or why not?

The good stuff

Positive messages: Thematic focus is corruption in fast food (contaminated meat, cover-ups); frustrated workers strike back as they can (e.g., spitting in food); characters lie, cheat, and argue.

What to watch for

Violence: The film's disturbing climax shows cattle slaughtered (actual bloody, graphic footage); crossing the U.S.-Mexican border is depicted as rough going (harsh conditions, thirst, exhaustion, passing out); discussion of McDonald's robbery (unseen); worker loses leg in plant machine (bloody and graphic).
Sex: Two brief sex scenes in vehicles (one shows breasts and indicates nude bodies, the other is "doggy style" and uncomfortable, as the creepy floor manager has sex with female employees in exchange for favors at work); another sex scene in the plant freezer (not explicit); sexual slang ("slut," "balls," "dick"); Doug plays a porn movie in his hotel room (you only hear moans, no image, as he looks at the screen); uncle offers his niece $1000 if she doesn't get pregnant by age 21.
Language: Repeated uses of "f--k" (20+), plus other language, including "ass," "s--t," "hell," "damn," "crap," and "sons of bitches."
Consumerism: Thematic focus on marketing fast food (McDonald's-style, though the company in the movie is the fictional "Mickey's"); specific references to ESPN, McDonald's, Fuddruckers.
Drinking, drugs and smoking: Smoking cigarettes, drinking, smoking marijuana, allusions to "meth freaks," snorting drugs; some workers are visibly high on the job.

Common Sense Media An independent nonprofit dedicated to providing families the information they need to help kids thrive in a world of media and technology. © Common Sense Media Inc. 2010. All rights reserved.