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In sealed rooms, as sterile as computer microprocessor factories, chicks hatch while being closely monitored. A huge hose sucks salmon out of a fjord. Metal teeth chomp up fields of sunflowers which, thanks to chemicals, have withered at just the right time. On mechanized conveyer systems, chickens are cut up and pigs are gutted in seconds, although cows take a little longer.

OUR DAILY BREAD reveals the little-known world of high-tech agriculture. In a series of visually stunning, continuously tracking, wide-screen images that seem right out of a science-fiction movie, we see the places where food is cultivated and processed: surreal landscapes optimized for agricultural machinery, clean rooms in cool industrial buildings designed for maximum efficiency, and elaborate machines that operate on a 'disassembly line' basis.

There's little space for humans here. They almost seem like flaws in this system: undersized and vulnerable, though they adapt as best they can, with chemical suits, respirators, ear protectors, and helmets. They do the jobs for which machines have not yet been invented.

Dispensing entirely with explanatory commentary or 'talking-head' interviews, OUR DAILY BREAD unfolds on the screen like a disturbing dream: an endlessly fascinating flow of images, an insistent gaze, accompanied only by the persistent industrial soundtrack—whirring, clattering, booming, slurping—of the ingenious marvels of mechanization employed by agri-business.

While this remarkable documentary will likely engender fascination, awe and even shock amongst viewers, OUR DAILY BREAD simply aims to show the industrial production of food as a reflection of our society's values: plenty of everything, made as quickly and as efficiently as modern technology permits.

 “The 2001: A Space Odyssey of modern food production.” —Stuart Klawans, The Nation

 “DEVASTATING! A MUST-SEE!" —The New York Times

 “Served up on high definition Blu-ray! The HD bump given to this [film] is something to be thankful for." —ScreenAnarchy

 “A visual poem about the sources of our food, Nikolaus Geyrhalter’s haunting OUR DAILY BREAD is finally available in beautiful Blu-ray." —Movies.com

 “A rare achievement in the documentary film genre…reflexive, subtle and intelligent.” —Martha Blassnigg, Leonardo Digital Reviews 

 “Casts a calmly unsettling spell…This is ‘Fast Food Nation’ envisioned, ‘Koyaanisqatsi’-like, on a grand scale: ‘Fast Food Planet.’” —Michael Phillips, The Chicago Tribune

 “An invigoratingly subtle form of political cinema.” —Richard Porton, Cinema Scope

“OUTSTANDING! PROVOCATIVE! Eccentrically lovely and frequently horrifying." —Premiere

“Critic's Pick!" —New York Magazine

“A most perturbing experience guaranteed to haunt you for meals to come.” —Kam Williams, UpstageMagazine.com

“What might sound sanitizing and horrendously tiresome actually turns out to be a galvanic and striking work.” —Chris Cabin, filmcritic.com

“Provides an insight into modern farming and food-making…thoroughly interrogatory and demanding.” —Leo Goldsmith, Not Coming to a Theater Near You

“Intelligent, well-crafted…a wordless and poetic look at the mechanisms of the modern food-supply industry… It’s surprising, insightful, at times ominous, but never less than arresting.” —Gourmet

“Stunning!” —Noel Murray, The Onion

“Hypnotic and magisterial…monumental and surreal…a strange look at one of the many worlds behind our accepted world.” —Ray Pride, New City

“Blandly surreal and mundanely terrifying—a beautifully photographed glimpse inside a science-driven and machine-infested parallel reality as hypnotic as it is impersonal…Whether the result of all Geyrhalter’s uninflected visual craft is a tone poem or a horror movie may ultimately depend on which side of the fork the viewer’s sympathies reside on.” —Ray Greene, Boxoffice.com

“A POWERFUL CINEMATIC EXPERIENCE! A series of shocking and indelible images... unremittingly merciless and nightmarish... A great and important film." —Joris Ivens Jury, Amsterdam International Documentary Festival