There are very few documentaries that have changed the way I live. One of them was What the Health.
The 2017 documentary, with its startling claims about the meat, dairy and food industry, inspired me to turn vegan almost overnight. It didn't last long, but it fundamentally changed the way I thought about what ended up on my plate.
Watching Netflix's latest food documentary, Big Chicken: A Fast Food Conspiracy, fronted by British comedian Mo Gilligan, I wasn't suddenly inspired to swear off fried chicken. But it left me with plenty of food for thought.
The premise sounds more like a comedy sketch than a serious investigation. Gilligan commits to eating nothing but fried chicken for 28 days – 84 meals in total. Along the way, he sets out to answer a surprisingly broad question: how did fried chicken become one of the world's favourite foods, and what does our obsession with it really cost?
The answer, it turns out, has very little to do with calories.
Rather than focusing solely on the obvious health risks of surviving on deep-fried food, the documentary digs into the enormous global industry behind it. Gilligan travels from his home in London to the US, where the biggest fried chicken brands come from.
From Houston, the “modern fried chicken capital”, to New Orleans and Arkansas, he traces the evolution of fried chicken – from a dish perfected by enslaved black cooks into a $100 billion global business. Along the way, he explores how chickens are bred to grow unnaturally quickly, why flavour increasingly comes from processing rather than farming, and how aggressive marketing helped turn fried chicken into a cultural phenomenon.
The documentary is perhaps at its strongest when it widens the conversation beyond food itself. It explores the alarming rise of food deserts in the US – communities, often in low-income neighbourhoods, where affordable, nutritious food is scarce while fast-food outlets line seemingly every street corner.
Gilligan also sheds light on the environmental impact of industrial poultry farming and allegations of exploitative labour practices – including the use of mostly undocumented workers and minors – in parts of the supply chain.
These issues aren't entirely new or specific to the chicken industry, but that doesn't make them any less important. If anything, Gilligan's documentary feels like an accessible introduction for a new generation, reminding viewers that the true cost of cheap food often extends far beyond what's on the menu.
Big Chicken: A Fast Food Conspiracy has echoes of the Oscar-nominated 2004 documentary Super Size Me, in which filmmaker Morgan Spurlock lived on a diet of McDonald’s for a month to illustrate the dangers of fast food.
But in Gilligan's film, the physical transformation is only one thread in a much larger story about economics, race, culture, marketing and corporate responsibility.
Gilligan is an inspired choice to lead the story. Endlessly likeable, he never positions himself as an expert or activist. Instead, he asks the questions most viewers would, openly admits when he's conflicted and is refreshingly willing to be vulnerable – at one point acknowledging his own role in promoting fried chicken brands.
The film's greatest strength is that it never preaches. Instead, it raises nuanced questions and challenges us to consider what we're willing to overlook for the sake of convenience.
