Food—Weapon of Conquest (Warwick Pictures; United Artists), a propaganda documentary film, makes a thrilling story of the role of food in World War II and after. Lucid, instructive, it is just what the U.S. Department of Agriculture might have ordered to explain its new wartime strategy for the land. It was made, not in Hollywood, but in Canada.
The picture focuses first on Germany, to show how a modern nation wages war with food as a major weapon. On the home front fats are turned into high explosives for the Wehrmacht's arsenal, apples become alcohol for fuel, releasing high-grade fuel for the Luftwaffe's planes, milk refineries spill out lubricating oil for the submarine fleets. Farmers grow what they are told to grow, and the soybean (twice the strength of meat at a quarter the price) is the armed forces' basic ration. It is mixed into almost every dish the soldiers eat and, Food suggests, may even be Hitler's vaunted secret weapon.
Dismissing the fond notion that the Third Reich can easily be starved into submission, the picture aptly illuminates the Nazis' use of food to control their conquered peoples. In stricken cities food is used to lure skilled workers to the Nazi war industries; in other places food is removed so that Jews and unwanted nationals will die. Those who play ball with the Nazis eat better than those who don't. The Nazis know that the undernourished are too numb to revolt.
The role of America's fertile acres in fighting this cruel tyranny is succinctly set forth. They must yield less of the basic peacetime crops (wheat, tobacco, cotton), more of the nutritive foods which raise a people's health to battle strength—fresh meat & vegetables, dairy produce, fruit, eggs, etc. Moreover, they must produce enough of these to feed not only the home front but also its armed forces and allies overseas. Says Food (paraphrasing Secretary of Agriculture Wickard) America's is the "soil which will win the war and write the future."
This cinematic editorial is almost a blueprint of how to make an involved, dull, major aspect of World War II understandable and acceptable to moviegoers. Its scenes are a nicely edited compilation of captured German war films, Allied newsreels, and a few sequences shot by the Canadian Government film unit. The trick is to put the ingredients together to produce a picture like Food.
The Magnificent Dope (20th Century-Fox) is home-grown Henry Fonda, playing another "Shucks, Ma!" role, which permits him to make one very interesting observation: laziness is the father of invention. His reasoning: In Piltdown days, thirsty cavemen had to run to the river for a drink, scurry back to their caves again. Go-getters didn't mind that chore, but some lazy caveman did. He invented the bucket.
Obviously, this kind of mentality is not what the Dawson Institute (How to Succeed in Spite of Yourself) is looking for. It is stuck with country boy Fonda, however, because its impoverished head (Don Ameche) has selected him as the nationwide winner of a contest for the man least likely to succeed. The prize is $500 cash and a course at the Institute. Fonda wants the cash only; Ameche has to make his unwilling pupil a success.