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Comment
06/09/07
Black Gold (2006)
85 %
Reviews Counted: 48 Fresh: 41 Rotten:7 Average Rating: 6.9/10
Consensus:
Black Gold is an eye-opening account of the winners and losers in the global coffee trade.
Rated: U
Runtime: 82 mins
Theatrical Release: 08-06-2007
Synopsis: In an increasingly global economy, where the profit margins of huge multinational coffee companies continue to rise, prices paid for coffee harvests have reached an all-time low, forcing farmers in some of the world's poorest countries to abandon their once bountiful fields. Among the... [More]
Genre: Education/General Interest
Reviews
Top Critic
While the film is quick to posit fair trade as a solution, it fails to answer why, even with Meskela’s admirable initiatives, his coffee farmers still struggle to buy shoes.
06/08/07
Top Critic
A worthy look at an exploitation that really shouldn't exist in this day and age, Black Gold will hopefully shock audiences into looking for the Fairtrade symbol next time they're in the supermarket.
06/08/07
Top Critic
True, fair trade coffee is not the newest story around, but Black Gold still makes for arresting viewing.
06/08/07
Top Critic
Contrast that with shots of the grower’s malnourished children relying on emergency foreign aid and it’s enough to make your blood boil – never mind the coffee.
06/08/07
Intimate interviews with starving farmers selling beans for 24p a kilo while we pay £2 a cup will make you appreciate the importance of fair-trade when ordering your next double-shot, skinny latte.
06/08/07
While it may prompt some to think again next time they're in Starbucks, this astute insight into the coffee business is better at lauding the good guys than taking the multinationals to task for the iniquities of the global economy.
06/08/07
Top Critic
More dynamism and knowledge in the telling and fewer cheap shots at young Starbucks workers in Seattle wouldn’t have gone amiss.
10/28/06
Top Critic
It is attractively shot, thoughtfully edited, provocatively argued, and might just have you turning its issues over in your mind late into the night - or is that just the effect of so much coffee?
06/12/07
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05/12/07
An important and timely film that may make you think twice before downing your next cup of joe.
01/13/07
Whether due to resources or time or just plain laziness, directors Marc and Nick Francis have fashioned a rather shapeless movie that raises many good points but fails to fully investigate its findings.
01/12/07
If that $2 cup of Starbucks didn't jolt you awake, this documentary by Marc and Nick Francis might do the trick.
01/12/07
Black Gold moves at an inexorable pace, painstakingly building a case until suddenly it looms very large and casts an even longer shadow.
01/11/07
Top Critic
... there is an additional irony to the title: The raw beans are not themselves black, but the growers are.
01/11/07
The film's effectiveness is bolstered by juxtaposed scenes of fat and happy Americans and Europeans slurping up frozen chai lattes and clucking about how big Starbuck's is getting with scenes of children going into 'therapeutic feeding centers'.
12/30/06
Black Gold raises issues in an engaging way without preaching or becoming a lesson in economics. At the end of it all you will certainly be looking for those Fair Trade stickers.
12/30/06
Warm relaxing pace becomes languishing, most of the beans have been spilt by the halfway mark. Still, it's definitely educational, an effective call to action.
12/29/06
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