Nice effects though.

An absolute waste of money

Absolutely brilliant

It is not only a funny movie, but it allows a great amount of joy for anyone who watches it.

If the point of this documentary is to portray Walmart in the worst possible light then it was a complete success. However, I believe the goal of the film was to present us with convincing arguments that we are paying a high price for low cost. In this respect it fails miserably. It consists almost exclusively of small town business owners who prior to Walmart were some of the comparatively wealthiest in their town; but now are angry that the very capitalism that brought their good fortune is now taking it away. The remainder consists of disgruntled employees who seem to at the very least suggest that any Walmart employee should make 40K a year - which is simply unrealistic for a stocker or cashier. So long as a coherent argument was made in this film, I would still give it 5 out of 10, but it seems to lack any legitimate reasoning for its real thesis that Walmart is evil. One would be much better served by a PBS documentary attempting to address the influence of Walmart in American culture.

Alright, so I understand that Wal-Mart is a destructive conglomerate thats method of business permits some very questionable ethics. I am no fan of the chain and I avoid it every chance I get. I realize that there are some major issues surrounding Wal-Mart and they are indeed issues that need to be brought to light. I only wish they could have been displayed in a more controlled and organized way than how Robert Greenwald angrily and sporadically conveys the story in his documentary, Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price. In this documentary, Greenwald examines how Wal-Mart has practically monopolized the retail industry and how it destroys small businesses in any community where it is introduced. He also takes a look at Wal-Mart's employment and how they underpay their employees and fail to provide them with decent benefits. There is undoubtedly some important stuff in this documentary, but Greenwald's execution of his focuses doesn't always succeed.If you just look at the points this film is trying to make then it is an excellent documentary. It brings to light some very important things and shows just how destructive of a corporation Wal-Mart is. There is some heavy bias throughout this film and not one single positive thing is said about Wal-Mart, but the fact of the matter is that there isn't really anything positive to say about Wal-Mart. It is what it is, and when you look at the facts you can't really spin that into a positive light. The bulk of this film is interviews with former Wal-Mart managers and current Wal-Mart employees who all provide first hand evidence of the mistreatment going on behind the scenes in Wal-Mart. Things like turning over employees to welfare instead of insurance provided by the company, or stalking employees who might be trying to unionize is just sickening. I would be tempted to take these testimonies with a grain of salt if the consistencies between all of the interviewees weren't so prevalent. When you have so many people from all over the country saying the same things about Wal-Mart it is pretty obvious that this problem is real and it is serious.Where this films major issues come from are in its rhetoric. This documentary has serious structure issues and doesn't seem to follow a straight path. The important message here is lost amidst a lack of control and organization that is crucial to any call-to-action documentary like this. Plus this is just a very angry film. Greenwald loses a lot of his focus when he almost seems to go on cinematic tangents fueled by frustration. Greenwald's lets his anger run amok in this film and it seriously detracts from the films meaning. He spends so much of the documentary just attacking Wal-Mart executives and is only preaching to the choir. He just keeps pushing his point that these executives are evil people and Wal-Mart is nothing but an evil company hell bent on taking over the retail world. I could buy into this if the documentary had presented its arguments in a more eloquent way, rather than bashing these Wal-Mart executives and continuously shooting pity at us through the plethora of interviews.And what this film is missing altogether is the presentation of a real solution to the problem that the average consumer can partake in. He shows what employees have done for themselves, but the film provides no real answer on how to take down Wal-Mart. In a way it goes without saying that the easiest solution would be not to buy from Wal-Mart. The problem is that Greenwald doesn't present that choice to us in a sophisticated manner. Instead he makes the film a guilt trip that forces us into not buying Wal-Mart. However, the fact of the matter is that people are still going to buy from Wal-Mart no matter what. Not every single Wal-Mart consumer is going to see this film, and some of the ones who do aren't going to be affected by it enough to stop shopping at Wal-Mart. At the end of the day Wal-Mart still has the lowest prices out of any of the supermarkets and retail stores around. How they achieve this is sickeningly unethical, but that won't matter to many people in a society where ethics have been superseded by convenience.So my point being, there has to be another way to stop the Wal-Mart reign of terror, but Greenwald either won't tell us or doesn't know. My guess is the latter. And that is why, as a whole, Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price fails in its ultimate goals. We learn some interesting things in it and it is undeniably disturbing just how terrible Wal-Mart treats its employees and just how negative its effect is on other businesses, but the way these facts are presented are just too emotional and too angry to really take seriously. Watch this movie if you want to understand the Wal-Mart conspiracy a little more, but don't expect anything groundbreaking and don't look for a thought provoking message.

I dread grocery shopping, especially in the most dreariest of places - Wal-Mart Supercenter. I had to be DRAGGED out by my family to accompany them and it's pretty boring to me! Robert Greenwald's documentary, WAL-MART: THE HIGH COST OF LOW PRICE, further fueled my animosity of doing grocery shopping at a Wal-mart Supercenter. Here, it explains that the largest wholesale retail chain in the US forces local businesses to close, has an inferior health care policy (One worker uses WIC to support the nutritious aspect of family survival.), is being racist and sexist (One black worker recalls a situation in which his coworker taunts, "Eeenie, meenie, miney, moe/Catch the N-word by the toe..."), and supports overseas full-time labor. The part that touched me the most is when the Chinese factory workers, Princess and Little Bear, lament on their work shift in the factory. The second most profound part pertains to the big-box-store chain's victor over small, local businesses in economic competition. Needless to say, this film was shot a year after the National Trust for Historic Preservation earmarked Vermont as a whole because of Wal-Mart's urban sprawl.This is a worthy film to view, whether you are a member of The Service Employees International Union (SEIU), a relative of slain Texas college student Megan Leann Holden, or someone who wants a Wal-Mart-free community. (You don't have to be a member of the National Trust for Historic Preservation!)

I don't like Wal Mart. In fact, I hate Wal Mart. And I an not a liberal, I am a radical.I am proud to be an American radical, in the tradition of our Founding Fathers, who wrote the most radical document of its time, the US Constitution. I love my country. I really do. I'm about to take an oath to devote by life to upholding its laws. But I hate Wal Mart.And yunno what I hate more than I hate Wal-Mart? This holier than thou, ivory tower, I joined the Young Socialist Workers Party because my daddy bought me a BMW instead of a Mercedes movie.Back to Wal Mart. Let's not kid ourselves, it's a miserable place. As shopping day approaches, I dread going there. I used to work there while I was in law school, so I know how they treat their employees. Everything from the manky bathrooms to the inefficient checkout lines to the hopeless looks on the faces of my fellow patrons and the workers makes me dread Wal Mart.But, get this, you rich, guilty sons of privilege. I don't have the luxury of choosing not to shop at Wal Mart. If I don't shop at Wal Mart, I don't eat. Do you know how much four years of college and three years of graduate school costs? Of course you don't. You were born with a silver spoon full of WASP upper class guilt in your mouth.I find this documentary demeaning to all working class people, and all people of other classes from working-class backgrounds because it makes us seem like a bunch of ill-mannered, uneducated slack-jawed pigs crowding into the trough because we're too lazy and stupid to realise what a lousy place it is. We're too poor and too black and too ethnic to know better, right? So you rich WASPs have to come down from the mountain and tell it like it is? Whether it comes from some right wing corporate lackey or some left-leaning do-gooder, it still feels the same to be talked down to, I assure you.We know all about Wal Mart. We work there, we shop there, we live in the communities it serves. Don't you dare point your plastic finger at me and tell me what you think you know about being working-class in America, what you think you know about our neighborhoods and our communities and our way of life. You don't know, and you never will know. If you don't like Wal Mart, don't shop there. We don't have a choice. You don't understand that, and you never will.Will I shop at Wal Mart when I can afford not to, anymore? You bet. But until then, as much as I hate it, I'm grateful it's there. I need Wal Mart. Wal Mart shoppers and workers need Wal Mart, as much as some of us admittedly hate them and everything they stand for.Why don't you make a movie about that? A movie about why places like Wal Mart exist and what's been done to the working-class and the poor and the lower middle class in this country and how we're all being pummeled and squeezed back into the 1890's? Now there's movie I'd like to see. But I'm sure one of us would have to make it, not one of you. Why don't you go have a coffee at Starbucks, and if you have no solutions to contribute to our problems, just more empty suit preaching, then just leave us alone.