The Perfect Friday Night Date Movie

Prep the popcorn and get ready for some hardcore entertainment. “Consumed,” a recently-released movie by Journeyman Pictures (not affiliated with the Journeyman featured on this blog recently), is sure to be this summer’s blockbuster hit.

Or not.

Unlike most (or any) blockbusters, Consumed is a thought-provoking documentary that tries to unearth the root causes of pathological consumerism. Through narration and interviews with consumer and psychology experts, Consumed drives home the point that consumption and the marketing that fuels it is the byproduct of misplaced evolutionary imperatives. The psychological emphasis is what really separates Consumed from other movies on the topic like The Story of Stuff, which focus primarily on the environmental and human rights impact of consumerism.

True to its subject, the bulk of the movie is a real downer, with some experts saying we as a species are hardwired to consume until we run out of things to consume (see Easter Island).

But there are sunnier perspectives expressed in the film; chiefly that our unsustainable consumer culture is but a drop in the bucket of human evolution; that for millions of years we have lived in a state of equilibrium with the earth and this last 70 years or so will be a temporary “what-the-hell-were-we-thinking” period of species maturation (our words, not theirs).

Whether the future holds a consumer heaven or hell remains to be seen. Either way, something’s gotta change. Hopefully, movies like Consumed will move the conversation forward, expressing both the self-evident perils of the present as well as the potential for a future not characterized by mindless and lethal consumer behavior. Give it a watch.

Via Treehugger

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