Taking the Plant’s Point of View: The Botany of Desire on Film (VIDEO)
October 27th, 2009 By Paula Crossfield
The Botany of Desire is not a political book. But as the author, Michael Pollan, said last Thursday in New York City at a debut of the film version (which airs tomorrow night on PBS at 8pm EST), it was the “sourdough starter” for the books that proceeded it, like The Omnivore’s Dilemma and In Defense of Food. Specifically, writing about potato production in the last quarter, which focuses on large scale agriculture and GMOs, was “the wake-up call” that led Mr. Pollan to understand that our food system is unsustainable.
The film is not necessarily supposed to be political, either. However, it does bring up a lot of questions about how we view our relationship to the plants featured: apples, tulips, cannabis, and potatoes. Primarily, the documentary focuses on how these plants used our desire for sweetness, beauty, intoxication and control to enable their propagation. But to propose that somehow plants have cultivated us is still revolutionary eight years after the book’s debut. Read More