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 Super Size Me
by Steve
 The buzz surrounding "Super Size Me" this year has been second only to Mike Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11, but Mike's had a lot more experience generating buzz than this film's rookie director, Morgan Spurlock. And that buzz is fully justified; this movie is brilliant! It's a funny, but serious, look at America's obesity problem and its relationship with fast food.
He first sets the stage by talking about how the two fat girls' case against McDonald's fell through because they couldn't definitively prove that McDonald's was to blame; there was a line in the lawsuit that said something like "If you can prove that McDonald's food is really that bad for you, this case might have some merit." And this was Spurlock's impetus for his "experiment":
For thirty days, nothing but McDonald's. (Doc says "Can't you at least take an aspirin?" and he replies, "I'll think about it.") He has to eat at least one of everything they sell at some point during the month. (Urgh! think of the McRib! The Horror!) If asked to supersize, take it. (He doesn't say it but I think he had a blanket upsell rule; he seems to have a lot of sundaes.)
And from then on, it's a ninety-minute laugh. I'm sure the comments will have a lot of spoiler lines, but worry not; if someone told me ahead of time "he pukes" it wouldn't diminish the experience one iota.
In the end, it's a ringing and dead on conviction of the sins of big business. He touches on advertising. He touches on the shifting responsibility. He touches on cost-driven food processing. (When he discusses McNuggets, throughout the audience there was a smattering of reminiscence about the famous Wendy's "parts is parts" commercial.) But nowhere does he let YOU off the hook. After all, they're not stuffing it down your throat.
Before we'd gone in, I thought to myself that I wanted an ice cream from the place next door to the theater, before we went in. The whole time through I was drinking on a colossal diet coke. (I wish they sold colossal water instead; $3 for a liter of Coca-Cola Brita-water (ie. Dasani) is a crime!) When I left the theater, I considered swearing off fast food permanently. I still may, I'm not eating it any time soon, but I try to never say never. :)
Seriously. Put down the damn cheeseburger and watch the movie.
ps. He really does puke. Yes, they show it.
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