''Dive!'' is an American
documentary film
A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...
directed by Jeremy Seifert.
Premise
The film follows director Jeremy Seifert and his friends as they
dumpster dive behind several grocery stores in the
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...
area to demonstrate the massive amount of food that is wasted each year in America. After showing that much of the food found in dumpsters is perfectly edible, Seifert confronts the managers of the stores to question why they don't donate more of it to local
food bank
A food bank is a non-profit, charitable organization that distributes food to those who have difficulty purchasing enough to avoid hunger, usually through intermediaries like food pantries and soup kitchens. Some food banks distribute food direct ...
s, especially in light of the 1996 Federal Bill
Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act, which protects them from liability for such donations. The legality and ethics of
dumpster diving
Dumpster diving (also totting, skipping, skip diving or skip salvage) is salvaging from large commercial, residential, industrial and construction containers for unused items discarded by their owners but deemed useful to the picker. It is n ...
are discussed when the stores begin locking up their dumpsters. Finally, Seifert considers the
waste
Waste (or wastes) are unwanted or unusable materials. Waste is any substance discarded after primary use, or is worthless, defective and of no use. A by-product, by contrast is a joint product of relatively minor economic value. A waste prod ...
created by individual consumers when they throw out food that is only partly bad or just past its
expiration date
An expiration date or expiry date is a previously determined date after which something should no longer be used, either by operation of law or by exceeding the anticipated shelf life for perishable goods. Expiration dates are applied to selecte ...
.
Release
''Dive!'' premiered in October 2009 at the
Gig Harbor Film Festival, where it won the Audience Choice Award. It has gone on to win awards at many other film festivals, including Best Documentary at the
DC Independent Film Festival and Best Film at the
Dutch Environmental Film Festival.
External links
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2010 films
American documentary films
Waste collection
2010 documentary films
DIY culture
Documentary films about food and drink
Documentary films about Los Angeles
2010s English-language films
2010s American films
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