In America, one in eight households goes hungry. Seven million children live with food insecurity. One in four veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars faces hunger at home. In the wealthiest nation in history, these are not statistics, they are indictments.
Hunger has long been debated in the media and the halls of Congress. Of all the draconian cuts in the “Big Beautiful Bill,” the reductions to SNAP drew the most public outcry. This crisis has been the subject of countless reports, films, and debates. Millions of Americans volunteer to feed their neighbors. And yet, despite this collective awareness and effort, hunger, a man-made crisis, persists. In fact, it is getting worse.
Hunger in the Land of Plenty will take a new approach. This film will not speak for the food insecure, it will let them speak for themselves. Those living with food insecurity hold the deepest wisdom about its causes and its solutions. Yet their voices are almost always missing. They are paraded as proof that hunger is their fault, or cast as passive victims to elicit donations. Either way, their voices are erased.
The filmmakers will travel across the country, to the coasts and the heartland alike, to listen. The narratives of those who live under the cloud of food insecurity offer the clearest path to understanding why this crisis endures. These Americans are subjects, not objects, and only through their lived experience can we begin to see the depth and persistence of hunger in America.
Alongside these stories, the film will investigate the broader issues that emerge from them, using expert interviews and investigative journalism to provide context. The focus will not follow preconceived theories or common myths. It will flow organically from the truths spoken by the food insecure themselves.
Hunger in the Land of Plenty will reveal that this crisis is not inevitable, but human-made. By finally listening to those who endure it every day, we can uncover not only why hunger persists in America, but how it can be ended.