This Anthony Bourdain-produced documentary isn’t the cinematic equivalent of eating your vegetables. “Wasted! The Story of Food Waste“ is a visual feast with lively animations and vibrant cinematography. Though it features scary statistics about the quantity of food being thrown away, it also features concrete ways that people are fighting the problem and what the audience can do.
Overwhelming statistics open the film: billions of tons of food go uneaten, costing billions of dollars, while almost a billion people are starving. The problem begins with farming, and is rampant throughout the rest of the industry, including restaurants, grocery stores and home kitchens. After “Wasted!” shares the sorry state of affairs, it devotes most of its running time to individuals and companies around the world who are working to solve the issue. A British brewery makes beer with leftover bread. A New Orleans school teaches kids how to compost. Acclaimed Osteria Francesana chef Massimo Bottura runs a Milan soup kitchen that uses produce from the city’s markets.
Narrated by Bourdain, “Wasted!” also features other famous faces from the food industry, including Mario Batali, Dan Barber and Danny Bowien. The chefs are working to address the issue in a variety of ways, but the documentary also shows them enjoying a variety of oft-overlooked bits of cuisine, from cauliflower greens to pig’s uterus. Though the latter may not sound appetizing to most viewers (which is part of the problem), this isn’t a film you should watch on an empty stomach.
Emmy winners Anna Chai and Nari Kye make their feature directorial debut with “Wasted!,” but they’ve spent years doing similar work on television with “No Reservations,” “The Layover” and “The Mind of a Chef.” This is polished work, with interesting interviews, stop-motion animation and a budget that takes them around the world. It’s also not without humor, from the opening salvos launched from an angry Bourdain at the world to the closing credits song from “Sesame Street“‘s trash-loving citizen.
As narrator, interview subject and producer, Bourdain is everywhere here. If you’re not a fan of his brash approach to food and his fellow humans, this may be one to skip. But foodies who love the chef’s broad palate, adventurous spirit and bold proclamations on the state of the world will find “Wasted!” to their tastes.
Chai and Kai’s engaging, entertaining film should appeal to a wide audience, particularly those who binge Bourdain’s various series or “Chef’s Table” on Netflix. “Wasted!” is passionate about food, and that’s part of its argument about how to solve the problem of wasting it. If you care about food, you’ll be more likely to think through your purchasing and cooking choices and less likely to let any of it go into the trash. What’s surprising is that the documentary doesn’t feel didactic as it’s teaching the audience how to help out. It presents solutions as a win-win: our efforts will save individual consumers and companies money, while giving people the opportunity to taste something new. [B+]