Going to the movies and eating popcorn—a relationship that today seems like a sine qua non, as if it had always existed. But it hasn’t always been this way. The history of popcorn at the movies also responds to sociocultural factors. Let me explain: when the first cinemas with silent films opened, the experience was an exclusive privilege for those who could afford the expensive tickets and were literate enough to read the words on screen. When sound cinema was introduced, it was no longer reserved only for the literate class. Alongside this phenomenon, popcorn was a street food. Little by little, street vendors began to set up outside movie theaters, which were attracting a growing and more diverse audience. Initially, popcorn was a clandestine snack, even prohibited in many theaters. Gradually, theater owners began renting space in their lobbies to popcorn vendors, until they realized it was a great business. They left a few exclusive theaters without access to popcorn and eventually saw that the theaters selling popcorn were the most profitable. With World War II and the rationing of sugar for sweets and sodas, popcorn became the most profitable snack to sell at the movies. Today, food sales are the main business for cinemas, far surpassing profits from ticket sales. This example shows how the relationship between social context and foods we now see as symbols of a situation has not always existed.
But what about movies and the way they portray food? It seems that food in cinema represents a subgenre that has attracted the attention of researchers. In this sense, iconic films like Vatel, Like Water for Chocolate, Babette’s Feast, Chef, and Ratatouille portray the vast universe of preparing food and its consumption: the symbols we assign to food, the importance of pleasure, the emotional bonds we invest in foods tied to situations, the role of food in identifying a human group that shares, and how what we eat generates social inclusion and exclusion.
There is, however, another area of cinema and its relationship with food that I find fascinating and less discussed. It is when a film does not have a gastronomic theme per se, but food becomes the perfect vehicle to illustrate human relationships. An example is how Quentin Tarantino always uses food to illustrate power dynamics: from a Nazi eating what appears to be the perfect apple strudel while speaking with a disguised Jewish woman in Inglorious Basterds, to two hitmen in an opening dialogue in Pulp Fiction discussing the cultural difference in naming a hamburger in France and the United States. The master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock, was aware of the power of food to evoke emotions, so much so that in Suspicion, where a wealthy heiress suspects her husband wants to kill her, all the tension, camera focus, and suspense are masterfully placed on a simple glass of milk. What about Rocky’s breakfast of champions? We all remember scenes of dialogue in cinema, where family or a social group is usually seated at the table. It is the most powerful circumstance to illustrate the social bonds established between characters.
When cinema aims to reflect reality, inevitably reality surpasses fiction. The next time you watch a film involving food, take a critical look, and you’ll see that behind that bite lies a whole series of symbolisms.
Twitter: @Lillie_ML
Originally published in El Economista
#cinema #films #food #habits #practices #customs
— This article was originally published in Spanish by Liliana Martínez Lomelí. Translation generated with AI from the original text.