Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price (Paperback)

by Greg Spotts (Author), Robert Greenwald (Introduction) "Robert Greenwald is too smiley to be an activist..." (more)
Key Phrases: Retail Project, Lee Scott, Wal-Mart Week (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
In this fast-paced companion book to Robert Greenwald’s explosive documentary Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, author Greg Spotts takes you behind the scenes of the making of this controversial film and the grass-roots pressure campaign challenging one of the world’s largest and most powerful companies.

The story of a wide-ranging investigation that was kept secret from its target, this book describes Greenwald and his crew on a nine-month journey filled with breakthrough moments and unexpected challenges. Given unlimited access to the filmmakers, Spotts reveals the new tactics and technologies that are revolutionizing political filmmaking, offering inspiration for aspiring filmmakers and activists.

Director Robert Greenwald shares his filmmaking goals in an exclusive introduction. Revealing behind-the-scenes photographs and stills from the film "Filmmaker’s Toolbox" sidebars provide inside knowledge on how to make and market a political documentary.

About the Author
Greg Spotts serves on the Santa Monica Arts Commission. He is the director of the film American Jobs, a documentary looking at the loss of blue and white collar jobs to global sourcing.

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: The Disinformation Company (November 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1932857249
• ISBN-13: 978-1932857245
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #572,242 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars The Wrong Book, December 17, 2005

By	Kevin L. Nenstiel "omnivore" (Kearney, Nebraska) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Usually, when a book is published to coincide with the release of a documentary film, the book contains details and information that serve to flesh out the synoptic look that the documentary format provides. If you're looking for that sort of book here, I'm sorry, my friend. This is the wrong book.

Instead of looking at the information stored in the movie, this is a making-of document. It goes point-by-point through initial research and primary shooting up to about halfway through post-production. Also there are little pointers interspersed through the film on how to make politically motivated documentaries, in case the reader wants to be the Cecil B. DeMille of political harangues.

I'm sure there are people who are interested in the internal controversies that accompanied designing the poster for this film. I'm sure some people are interested on why one of the principal interviews, with a former Wal-Mart manager, takes place in a car and looks so incredibly cramped. But that's not why I bought this book, and that's probably not why you're considering it. This is E! True Hollywood Story stuff, not the content of a companion volume for a political diatribe.

Where this should be a book of hard facts that can be used in arguments against the continued invasion of the Wal-Martians, instead we get backlot gossip and pelf. Perhaps another book is in the offing in the near future, containing a more detailed look at the information in the movie. In the meantime, unless you hope to be a documentarian yourself, save your money. This isn't the book for which you're looking.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars thought this was the movie, September 25, 2008

By	Paul A. Spangler - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

It is how they made the movie and their struggle to get it out. I guess it may help those hoping to do the same thing.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The making of the film - with unlimited access to the filmmakers, March 18, 2006

By	D. Donovan, Editor/Sr. Reviewer "California B... (California, USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This companion to Robert Greenwald's documentary WAL-MART: THE HIGH COST OF LOW PRICE provides a behind-the-scenes focus on both the making of the film and the grass-roots pressure campaign challenging the world's biggest business. Greenwald and his crew went on a nine-month underground investigation kept secret from Wal-Mart as they put together their film: Spotts received unlimited access to the filmmakers and reveals their tactics, objectives, and how political filmmaking is changing businesses and the film world alike. It's hard to easily categorize this book - it could just as easily have been featured in our film column - but businesses shouldn't miss the discussion of the film methods and focus, which hold wide-reaching implications for future political film surveys of business inner circles.