The Dole Food Co. has sued a Swedish filmmaker and his company for defamation over a documentary that the food company says contains "patent falsehoods."

The conglomerate says the film's story about Nicaraguan workers who take Dole to court claiming they were made sterile through the company's pesticide use is inaccurate.Filmmaker Fredrik Gertten, who made Bananas!, is being sued by Dole, which says the film has inaccuracies. (Reed Saxon/Associated Press)

Bananas! was screened at the Los Angeles film festival in June, and a document filed by Dole on Wednesday says filmmaker Fredrik Gertten has plans to sell the film and keep showing it at other festivals.

"To screen, promote, and profit from this film, despite the fact that its entire premise has been adjudicated a fraud ... is the epitome of reckless and irresponsible conduct," Dole lawyer Theodore Boutrous Jr., wrote in the suit.

"It cannot possibly be justified or defended. It must stop."

Bananas! was shown twice at the festival, with a lengthy written disclaimer by organizers.

The disclaimer says the film did not present a fair and accurate account, but should be shown as "a case study" of what happens after a documentary is completed.

The documentary is an account of a legal battle, which began in 2007, against Dole by Nicaraguan workers, who had reportedly worked at the company's plantations.

In fact, the lawsuits — filed by L.A. lawyer Juan J. Dominguez — were thrown out of U.S. Superior Court in April.

In her ruling, Judge Victoria Chaney said lawyers for the workers had concocted a scheme to recruit people who had never worked for Dole, and trained them to lie in court and invent medical evidence.

Film's ending doesn't paint whole picture

The suit points out that Bananas! finishes with Dominguez winning $2.5 million US in punitive damages for five Nicaraguan workers, but doesn't take into account what happens later — when the suit is thrown out and Dominguez ends up facing contempt charges.

Dominguez has been reported to the State Bar of California and to federal prosecutors for perpetrating a fraud that would have extorted billions from Dole.

The documentary was completed before the fraud was uncovered.

Dole lawyers say Bananas! unfairly demonizes the company. The company had asked Gertten and his producer, Margarete Jangard, to make changes to the film.

Richard Lee, the lawyer representing the filmmaker and his company, called Dole's suit "without merit.

"Dole is attempting to keep a part of the long story of misuse of pesticides by multinational corporations from being told," Lee told Reuters.

With files from The Associated Press