By TEALDI (Stefano)
A film-journey that lives up to its subject matter, in a good hot and strong way!
In spite of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the world is still divided in two - on the one side the coffee producing countries, on the other those that drink it. This dividing line has influenced the world economy and the habits of individual populations.
But since the end of the 20th century, coffee has gone from being a local tradition to a planetary custom, with its temples, rituals and sects.
"What else?" The little capsule is the latest embodiment of a history that stretches back almost to the beginning of our era, to Arabia, when the Prophet Mohammed announced the new revealed religion, Islam.
After oil and steel, coffee is the most exchanged commodity in the world. Every day, coffee producers' lives are regulated by the prices fixed on the financial markets in Chicago, London and Hong Kong. It's hardly surprising, then, that fair-trade coffee has become such a widespread movement!
No other drink has adapted so largely to the customs of the societies its has conquered. An Expresso in Italy is a small, intense, creamy mouthful, consumed standing up, at the counter. In Turkey, Greece, Brazil and Africa, is it part of a slow, repetitive welcome ritual. The New World landed a few years ago on Planet Starbuck's (16,000 branches in 40 countries), where it discovered new behaviours, a new vocabulary, and a veritable coffee religion.
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