We Feed People is a documentary about José Andrés and his organization World Central Kitchen which goes to disaster areas to help feed and set up systems to continue feeding people in effected communities.
Part thriller, part biography, part educational video its not totally clear what the intent is. Even at it's conclusion there is no information/suggestions about organizations to donate/volunteer for. We follow Andrés as he goes to various natural disaster locations and how the World Central Kitchen operates and evolves over five years. It's really remarkable and it's work effective and necessary.
However there is points where Andrés biography unfolds in a limited way to provide context and there is simply a ton of questions left on the table. He's clearly a hot head, somewhat self involved, he seems to perpetually neglect his family, but he's got huge vision, a huge heart, and gets things done. He's a complicated guy. It doesn't seem like he or director Ron Howard have much interest in self examination so a lot of the personal stuff seems irrelevant. There also seems to be no interest in explaining how the WCK actually functions, towards the beginning there's a scene where money seems to be a vital and pressing issue and then its inexplicably resolved and after that there is no information about how the WCK actually receives funding. It's bizarre.
The work, the people, the effort from the WCK is commendable and from what we see its truly incredible work but virtually every aspect of the story- Andrés himself, his motivations and feelings, how the WCK actually works in any comprehensive way, and the stories of the people involved, WCK workers as well as those people in the effected communities- is only glossed over.
A beautiful looking scratch in the surface of a potentially fascinating story.
Currently streaming on Hulu.
Stream It.
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