Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers (1980)

A documentary on the history of garlic. Blank interviews chefs, garlic lovers, and historians about the their love of the 'stinking rose.'

Director:

Les Blank

Stars:

Antzonini Del Puerto, Kathleen Bendel, Harrod Blank

1 win.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Antzonini Del Puerto	...	Flamenco Singer, Sausage Chef
Kathleen Bendel	...	Garlic Queen
Harrod Blank	...	Youth Saved from Dysentary
Mary T. Brown	...	Cook Who Uses Garlic Salt
Robert Charles	...	La Vielle Maison, Truckee, CA
Henry Chung	...	Hunan Restaurant, San Francisco
Rose 'Pistolias' Evangelisti	...	Cook, Garlic Lover
Val Filice	...	Garlic Grower, Squid Chef
George Flintroy	...	Flinty's Barbecue, Oakland
Lloyd John Harris	...	Publisher: _Garlic Times_
Michael Goodwin	...	Interviewer, Recordist, Writer, Garlic Peeler
Maura Hagerty	...	Irish Garlic Eater
Lawrence Hershman	...	Gardener, Marin County
Werner Herzog	...	Film Director: Nosferatu
Benni McCarthy	...	Author: _Living with the Flowers_

Storyline

Often referred to as a stinking rose, garlic, in its culinary uses, generally evokes a love it or hate it response. Quite often, these responses are on cultural lines, where old world cultures have generally revered it in their cooking, while new world cultures have not. A renaissance of sorts is taking place in the use of garlic in the United States, with more and more immigrants bringing their use of the spice to the country, with more people desiring more spice in their food, with a desire to get back to the land and with the production of plant a large part of the Central California landscape. Many chefs are presented preparing dishes prominently featuring the spice. On the bad side, the association of garlic to bad breath is discussed. On the other side, its purported health benefits are also discussed. Other topics presented include its association to vampirism, and speculation of how people will want their garlic to be presented to them in the future.

---

Plot Keywords:

national film registry | garlic | interview | food | cooking | 

---

Genres:

Documentary | History

---

Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Official Sites:

Flower Films

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

October 1980 (USA)

Also Known As:

Vitlök är lika bra som tio mödrar

Filming Locations:

Berkeley, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Flower Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

51 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Trivia

At the film's premiere at the Film Forum in New York City the ushers walked up and down the aisle with sizzling pans of garlic filling the entire theater with the aroma of garlic.

---

Crazy Credits

To your good health!

---

Connections

Featured in Rotten: Garlic Breath (2018)

User Reviews

Les Blank

A documentary on the history of garlic. Les Blank interviews chefs, garlic lovers, and historians about the their love of the 'stinking rose.' The director recommends that, when the film is shown, a toaster oven containing several heads of garlic be turned on in the rear of the theater, unbeknownst to the audience, with the intended result that approximately halfway through the showing the entire theater will be filled with the smell of garlic.

Les Blank is an interesting character. I think his finest work is when he went around America, collecting the sounds of various regions. Much of what he caught on film was groundbreaking, and the natural environments he found may no longer exist. His exploration of garlic is far less important, but interesting in a sort of offbeat way. It's amusing that he even managed to get Werner Herzog to talk about the lack of garlic in "Nosferatu".