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Supersize Me - 5/7/04 - R - 96m
Morgan Spurlock - Himself
Director: Morgan Spurlock
Written by: Morgan Spurlock
Studio: Samuel Goldwyn
Official
Website
JEF
As scary as this documentary is, I can’t say that I’ll never eat “Micky-Ds” again, but it will be a long time until I get the taste of this movie outta my mind.
Storyline: A fairly simple premise. A man (Morgan Spurlock) happened to hear about a lawsuit brought upon the fast food giant McDonalds. Apparently these two young women were trying to sue McDonalds for making them fat. Sounds funny/sad and ridiculous, but it does bring some interesting questions to the table. Anyway, A spokesperson from McDonalds stated that McDonald’s’ food is good for you, and there is nothing wrong with it.
So, Morgan had his epiphany… If it’s that good for you, then you should be able to eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, with no adverse effects. So that is what he did for a month’s time. He ate nothing but McDonalds for a month, filmed it, and it’s effect to his own body, and at the same time created an entertaining and informative film about not just McDonalds, but the fast-food industry as a whole - and some the crazy things we do to our own bodies.
I suppose I should state my bias here first 
Yes, I’m a fan of McDonalds. I’ve had my times when I’ve visited them more than I should have. Maybe twice a week would have been the max (like a lunch one day, and a few days later a dinner). But then I started thinking about eating better, and tried cutting my fast-food intake to once a week. And now I’m doing even better to maybe once every 2 weeks. I’d like to get down to once a month (or less) and I think this film will help me reach that goal.
I almost went to McDonalds for lunch on the Saturday that we were scheduled to see this movie. I thought this might be the last time I have Micky D’s so why not have a “last supper”. But then I was worried, that maybe the film might show something really disgusting, and I might regret eating McDonalds for lunch. So I passed, and made myself a sandwich.
The film was good overall. A little while into the movie I found myself saying “Ok, lets wrap things up here, or give me something new” I was getting tired of seeing him eat. And then he did just that, and I was entertained again.
I’m not good at remembering facts and figures. So I won’t go into the trouble of mis-quoting some of the stats from the film. But there were a lot of interesting and sometimes scary facts. And throughout most of the film, they were presented in an entertaining and sometimes funny way.
I’ve seen several interviews with Morgan recently on the news shows. They all seem to be attacking him, which I don’t quite understand. They are trying to make him out to look like a kook who is “picking” on McDonalds. He may be a kook (cause anyone who would do this for 30 days must be a little “off”) but he is intelligent, and this was not really a personal attack on McDonalds.
Perhaps the scariest part for me was what is going on in the school cafeterias with the kids. I had no idea some of these things were happening. When I went to school we had typical cafeteria-style foods, but they were usually pretty well balanced. These things in the schools today are items like candy, soft drinks, French fries, cakes, etc… And the kids are left to their own to eat right. (Which most of the kids in the film were not doing)!
There is so much more, but the best thing to do is to go see this film. I especially encourage all parents to see this too. If not in the theatre, then be sure to rent the DVD.
One word of caution… If you are a bit over weight (which I am) the movie can be a harsh look in the mirror. I did not see too many overweight people in the audience, but I still think it is a film worth seeing.
Finally… Shame on McDonalds for not providing an official comment for the film, and for giving Murdock the “run-around” on his attempts to speak to a representative from McDonalds.
Jef
Here’s what Lyn thought…
