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man, i hate Wallyworld as much as the next guy, for how they treat their workers like crap, for how they have cheezy lovey-dovey ads about 'made in USA' when in reality 95% of their stuff is from chinese sweatshops, for how they screw small communities, and this film touches on all of that plus more, but this is amateur documentary 101. It feels more like a local news special report than a real documentary. and some of the stuff they blame wal-mart for, well its a bit ridiculous.
Pretty much most of the employees gripes were about getting no health care, or lousy health insurance, etc, etc. it wasn't about wages. I mean, its a mininum-wage job, what do you really expect worker there, stacking boxes, $15/hour or more? but the issue with lack of health care is more an American issue, hopefully addressed well in Michael Moore's upcoming 'Sicko' documentary. We have Wal-marts in Canada, and people for the most part just treat it as another minimum wage job. Health care isnt an issue. But its true even up here, that wal-mart considers full-time something like 20 hrs/week, and even though they could use more workers since stores are packed, they always seem to be short-staffed and only have a couple of checkout counters open.
The other issue they really pushed was how dangerous it is in their parking lots, how people have been raped, shot, killed, kidnapped, robbed. Well, see Moore's Bowling for Columbine to further analyze America's violent society. Once again, in Canada's walmarts, its not an issue. If my wife went to walmart, even at midnight, and told me she was scared in the parking lot, i'd laugh at her.
Or that part where some local lady is worried about having an empty ambandoned old PARKING LOT turned into a Walmart superstore. Oh, the humanity!!! can't walmart just leave that pristine parking lot alone? or that rich snob in california in her mansion who didnt want a walmart built close to her house, i guess because it would spoil her neighborhood of fake lakes and palm trees and golf courses built upon desert soil. give me a break, how can anoyone sympathize with those cases?
Overall, quite dissapointed at this film. I expect a LOT more investigation, and a LOT less fear-mongering.
4/10
