Big Boys Gone Bananas!*

How far will a big corporation go to protect its brand? Swedish filmmaker Fredrik Gertten's experienced this recently. His previous film BANANAS!* (IDFA 2009) recounts the lawsuit that 12 Nicaraguan plantation workers brought against the fruit giant Dole Food Company. The film was selected for competition by the Los Angeles Film Festival. Nothing wrong so far, right? But then Gertten gets a strange message: the festival removes Bananas!* from competition. Then a scathing article appears in the Los Angeles Business Journal about the film, and Gertten subsequently receives a letter from Dole's attorney threatening him with legal action. What follows is an unparalleled thriller that has Gertten capturing the entire process - from Dole attacking the producers with a defamation lawsuit and bullying scaretactics, to media control and PR spin. This personal film reveals precisely how a multinational will stop at nothing to get its way - freedom of speech is at stake. As Dole's PR company puts it, "It is easier to cope with a bad conscience than a bad reputation".

• Category

  Film & Animation

[rosenerik]

This should be shown in every cinema across the globe.

[Kalle Andersson]

Haven't seen the movie, eh?

[Bill D]

Food criminals are real criminals however much they try to hide their crooked ways. As citizens of planet Earth we cannot afford to allow these crooked corporations to further contaminate the planet. Their lawyers are liars.

That much is obvious. They cannot present their case without lying.

I am asking the supermarkets in our city to get rid of Dole products. (very politely, of course)

[Geri Lynn Weinstein-Matthews]

Yes we have no Bananas!



[handendaer]

not the only movie that should! still true though

[Snagabott]

In many ways this is a more important documentary than the first one.

[Carl Liljefors]

Another one of Dole's bitches...I really thought Americans had more pride than that

[OjDenEstort]

OBEY PROPAGANDA

FUCK CORPT AMERICA

[CptCryBaby]

I'll have to take your word. Hope I didn't make too big a fool.

[TheSlowThinker]

Actually you didn't. You slammed yourself. :)