Chocolat: Chocolate as Symbol of Globalization and Modernity
This paper examines the 2000 film Chocolat as a thematic study of globalization, modernity, and cultural change, using chocolate as its central symbol. The paper briefly traces chocolate's ancient Mesoamerican origins, its colonial spread to Europe, and its complex associations with sexuality, religion, politics, and economics. It then synopsizes the film's narrative — in which a wandering chocolatier transforms a repressed French village during Lent — and argues that chocolate functions as the thematic link between old conservative values and a newer, more humanistic worldview. Drawing on food studies, theology, and cultural anthropology, the paper also analyzes the concept of grace as expressed through women's gift-giving and feasting in the film.
- Introduction: Food, Identity, and Globalization: Food as cultural symbol and chocolate's global significance
- A Brief History of Chocolate: Chocolate's origins, colonial spread, and cultural meanings
- Synopsis of the Film Chocolat: Plot summary of the 2000 film Chocolat
- Chocolate as the Thematic Link Between Old and New: Chocolate as symbol of modernization and progressive change
- Grace, Gender, and the Transformative Power of Chocolate: Women, grace, sexuality, and religious transformation in the film
- Conclusion: A Village Forever Changed: Vianne's decision to stay and the village's transformation
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What makes this paper effective
- Integrates diverse scholarly sources — food history, cultural anthropology, theology, and film studies — to build a multidisciplinary argument about a single cultural object.
- Grounds the film analysis in concrete historical context, tracing chocolate from its Aztec and Maya origins through European colonialism to its appearance as a liberating force in 1950s France.
- Uses close reading of specific scenes (the chili-chocolate exchange, the Comte's gluttony, the Easter feast) to support broader thematic claims about modernity and grace.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates the use of a single cultural artifact — chocolate — as an analytical lens through which to examine intersecting themes of religion, gender, colonialism, and social change. This technique, common in cultural studies and food anthropology, anchors abstract arguments about modernization and grace in a tangible, historically rich object that the audience can follow across multiple disciplinary contexts.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with a theoretical framing of food as cultural symbol, then provides historical background on chocolate's global journey from Mesoamerica to Europe. A plot synopsis of the film follows, after which the analysis deepens to argue that chocolate is the thematic bridge between conservative Catholic tradition and a more humanistic, progressive worldview. The final analytical sections focus on grace, gender, and specific scenes, before a brief conclusion ties the transformation of the village back to the broader argument about globalization and modernity.
Introduction: Food, Identity, and Globalization
There is no better commodity to discuss than chocolate when looking at the globalization of food. Food can tell the most astounding stories and create a sense of identity for an entire culture. The 2000 film Chocolat, viewed through American eyes, is an example of the changes that can be symbolized by the power of a single food item — in this case, the rich historical and global food that is chocolate.
A food is the ideal cultural symbol that allows the historian to uncover hidden levels of meaning in social relationships and arrive at new understandings of the human experience. The pull of cultural anthropology and food studies is strong here, underscoring food as symbol and metaphor — a cultural numerator essential to the human equation (Super 165).
The history of chocolate spans the globe. The film Chocolat is an expression of that history, as well as its foundational and complex historical representation. This paper briefly discusses the history of chocolate and its role in the globalization of food, synopsizes the film Chocolat, and argues that chocolate has been used as a thematic representation of the human experience of modernization. Chocolate is rivaled only by coffee, tea, and sugar as a colonial crop of wealth that spread across the world as far as colonial arms could reach. In its rich history lie politics, love, economics, slavery, religion, and especially globalization (Clarence-Smith; Goodman, Lovejoy, and Sherratt 2).
The characters in the film, through chocolate and the experiences it brings into their lives — by its very existence in their small, conservative village in France in 1959 (Laubier 30) — broaden their lives and allow themselves to be drawn into a world of risk and reality. The characters become modern people of the world by opening their minds to what is real: the erotic and sensual pleasures that can transform them from a culture of hidden desires to one that expresses the broad nature of the human experience. Chocolate is the thematic link in the film between the old world and the new, global one.
Chocolat unfolds a morality tale about a single mother with Mayan Indian roots who wanders from town to town, spreading healing and understanding to sworn enemies in the form of gifts of chocolate. Vianne Rocher (Juliette Binoche), with her red shoes and colorful dresses, and her young daughter Anouk, blows into the village of Lansquenet at the beginning of Lent, upsetting the staid Lenten denials of the Catholic community (Mcfadden 117). Lent celebrates a time when individuals mirror the suffering of Christ to atone for their sins, through prayer, special services, and abstinent behaviors such as fasting, lasting from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday — a period of approximately six weeks.
Works Cited
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Mcfadden, Margaret H. "Gendering the Feast: Women, Spirituality, and Grace in Three Food Films." Reel Food: Essays on Food and Film. Ed. Anne L. Bower. New York: Routledge, 2004. 117–128.
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