Beer Wars
This is one of the movies that I personally added to the list after I saw it listed on Netflix. I'm actually a big fan of Documentaries, which surprisingly there are not a lot of on the list as part of the 365 Movie Challenge. Perhaps because I've already seen a lot of the ones that were recommended to me?
I've always loved the world of advertising, seeing how things are made, and then marketed to consumers. Especially beer, and this stems from a single night each year when advertisers and companies spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to market their product during the Super Bowl.
But to be perfectly honest, the whole process absolutely fascinates me from concept to the finished product. When I break it down there are really two reasons. The first, and I think rather obvious reason is because in our culture alcohol is still a bit taboo. Admittedly it is less taboo now than during prohibition, but we still have a lot of restrictions and laws on purchasing and the consumption of alcohol.
The second reason, is because of all of the "beer snobs." I actually use that term loosely, because I can understand what it is to be loyal to a brand. I'm a Coca-Cola snob. If given the choice between an inferior Pepsi Product or nothing, I'd be happy to take nothing and be on my way. If you haven't ran into a "beer snob" yet, you will eventually. You'll recognize them because they will have a tendency to rattle on about how mass market beers have no real flavors when you compare them to some of the smaller brewers' products.
I'm really don't know a lot about the beer that I drink, so I'm anxious to see how Beer Wars combines these aspects of their business and hope to gain a better appreciation and understanding of brewing in general.
After having watched the movie:
(Possible spoilers below)
Holy bias documentary Batman! For someone who is very passionate and favors the two largest brewing companies in America, this might not be the documentary for you. Which means the stereotypical "beer snobs" can rejoice, finally there is another voice that will back you and your love for fine flavored beer.
The main focused area of the documentary was the struggle small/independent breweries faced with marketing, and the distribution process among the giant brewers in American. As well as a little peak into the legal monopoly that the largest brewers have created. This is where things start to get political, and we start getting into issues with politicians and lobbyists.
The basic run down is this: State and Federal Laws say that brewers are not able to sell or ship directly to retailers. Thus introducing a third man, the distributor. The idea here being that the distributer would create a fair market for all brewers, but this system is a little like Communism. Sure it seems like a great idea and it works in theory, but eventually one guy is going want a bigger piece of the pie. In the beer industry, and from this documentary's perspective, the guy who wants a bigger piece of the pie is Anheuser-Busch.
Of course not really knowing much about the industry I found a lot of the aspects of the small brewing companies to in to be really interesting. I loved being able to get an inside look at a lot of the breweries, especially seeing and learning more about the brewing process. My absolute favorite part was when some of the brewers explained how they brewed particular beers. Again, not knowing a whole lot about beer in general this is what interested me the most.
Final thoughts: Beer Wars is at times political and dives into a bit of Corporate America. It is also rather biased so you'll have to try to work passed that. However it provides the first inside look that I'm aware of, into the business aspects of this billion dollar industry. So in this case, it's kind of taking the good with the bad. I think if you're more like me, and don't really know a lot about beer in general, or if you have a wealth of knowledge about brewing and consider yourself to be a "beer snob," you should be able to find something in this documentary for you.
OFFICIAL COUNT 26 DOWN 339 TO GO
Next up: Grindhouse: Planet Terror and Death Proof.
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