I liked the movie. Thought it portrayed fast food and what it can do to you well.

Anybody any thoughts?

I havent seen this but have a question. Is it really THAT engaging a story? I mean, it looks great and hillarious and all, but the majority of the public already knows that fast food is bad for them. With that in my mind is "Super Size Me" still worth watching???

Well Eccentro,

I understand what you are saying, and agree that most Americans already do know that fast food is bad for them. But maybe they dont know how bad!

Even the doctors in Super Size Me were incredibly surprised at how much his weight, cholesterol, body fat, blood pressure and any other bad thing like that you could think of went up.

I found the story somewhat engaging, but it could have been better. In the beginning he says that the surgeon general said that if someone proved that eating fast food 3 meals a day would significantly lower your health, then he would speak out against it or something, but the movie never really followed up on that fact.

I would say that the movie is worth watching, but dont expect it to be anything that special.

I thought it was a pretty decent movie. Even though I already knew George W. Bush is bad for me I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 anyways! The same situation applies here. Fast food is of course bad for you, it's watching the effects of the diet take it's toll on his body, mind and spirit that is most engaging and makes this film worthwhile.

Sure, the movie is plenty entertaining, and I'm sure it will make the final cut for Oscar Best Documentary, along with "Touching the Void." Probably nobody here knows what happened in Orange County just after this was released. A health enthusiast saw the film and said that you or HE could eat at McD's following the same criteria and not have his health take a nosedive as long as he exercised.

Of course, he proved his case. He even weighed less at the end of the 30 days than he did when he started, but I can't vouch for how much "extra" exercise he did.

My main criticisms of "Super Size Me" are that, after a while, it is obvious what was going on, and thus a sense of repetition set in. I still think it's very well-done, especially for a homemade movie.

This is the best documentary I've ever seen. It had a good score, humour, interviews, set-up and conclusion. Not only informative and makes you think but it is quite entertaining. It's not just a great documentary, it's a great movie. Everyone should see this. I can't even look at a fast food burger any more.

quote:

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Originally posted by mark f:
Sure, the movie is plenty entertaining, and I'm sure it will make the final cut for Oscar Best Documentary, along with "Touching the Void." Probably nobody here knows what happened in Orange County just after this was released. A health enthusiast saw the film and said that you or HE could eat at McD's following the same criteria and not have his health take a nosedive as long as he exercised.

Of course, he proved his case. He even weighed less at the end of the 30 days than he did when he started, but I can't vouch for how much "extra" exercise he did.

My main criticisms of "Super Size Me" are that, after a while, it is obvious what was going on, and thus a sense of repetition set in. I still think it's very well-done, especially for a homemade movie.

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Are you talking about Bowling for Morgan by chance?? Here's the link for those of us who havent seen this 30 minute completely free documentary http://www.bowlingformorgan.com

Bowling For Morgan was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen. He completely missed the point of Super. Morgan got as much exercise as the average American and ordered what typical American's eat. That Bowling dumbass only drank Diet Coke and ate sallads while mocking every segment of Super but with nothing to back it up (wow, he got a 3 year old to call Morgan a clown...impressive. And ooooh, he couldn't get an interview with Morgan the week Morgan was in Brazil). I feel dumber now having watched that. It only proved the depth of American ignorance committed to THE LIE and that Supersize Me is the real deal.

Nope, I never even heard of "Bowling For Morgan". I live in a plastic bubble. My comments are completely different. This guy's cholesterol actually went UP, but whatever!

The final thought of Bowling For Morgan makes sense, that we need to take responsibility for ourselves, but that doesn't make McDonalds any less evil. Why are there no healthy fast-foods? Subway is half-way healthy and it's the only one (in my town anyway). There's about 11 burger, pizza, and taco joints for every Subway. The world is rampant with these evil bastards and they get away with it because we turn a blind eye. Supersize is supposed to make you question how we are raised on a diet of television commercials made to brainwash us (and it works, there's an adage of "if we got 'em by 5, we got 'em for life" advertisers love). And whoever you're talking about mark f, Morgan got the average American workout a day. I'm sure anyone could, if they had the will power, eat Hellman's Mayo for a month and lose weight if he/she worked out the rest of the time but that's not what the average McAddict does. I've heard "Touching The Void" is wicked though (my friend pestered me the whole time it was in theatres).

Hey Filmore, maybe you want to put some of those thoughts into a thread talking about fast food and business. Olestra in chips

Love to but I don't know anything about it. Is that in Canada too? We took flouride out of our water, at least. What about MSG?

I never chimed in about this film, but I watched it again last night (Showtime free preview!) and I have to reiterate my enjoyment of it. I thought the whole thing had a great flow and, unlike mark, I never found it repetitive (except for the necessary repetition of Morgan's visits to McD's). It was funny and sad, at points, and while it is one-sided (his lack of exercise, mark points out, certainly led in part to his weight gain...but he points out that some American students get less than 45 minutes of exercise per week!) and there's certainly an overdetermination of the weight gain, it paints an unpleasant picture of what a diet that consists solely (or even mainly) of fast food can do to a fairly average American person. The average American doesn't exercise, so I don't really think it was unfair of Morgan not to exercise.

I agree with Filmore...this was a good documentary, but it's also a good MOVIE. I'm going to show it in my summer course on Business Ethics during the section on consumerism and consumer culture (we also read sections of Schlosser's Fast Food Nation) as a break from the academic readings. I try not to come off as overly biased against consumerism...does anyone have any suggestions of good pro-consumer readings, films, etc? In the interest of equal time? I'd prefer something that's not strictly free market economics...maybe something slightly more philosophical? Consumerism as freedom? Suggestions would be greatly appreciated!!!!

Just watched it and have been hunting down opposing view and it strikes me that most of the criticism mistakes the hook for the message.

The hook in the movie is the 30 day McD binge with no exercise. The results are predictable. The counters that you can live off fast food if you only eat the salad and exercise a lot miss the point that this is not what people are doing. And besides this is not the message of the film.

The message is about the industry, the culture surrounding it, and the targeting of children. We can talk about personal responsibility all we want but when most of what kids see about food is fast food advertising, their schools are feeding them the food, their schools are delivering the ads, and their parents are too busy to cook they learn that fast food is a good thing. For the industry to say everybody knows their food is bad for them is disingenuous when they are actively targeting children with the opposite message. The message of the movie is broader than this but I'm a parent of two year olds so this is the part that struck me the most.

Of course most of the criticism I have seen is from industry sponsored lobby groups.

Oh, and it's a good movie too.

I think there's a nice set of commentary (non industry lobbiers!) on a similar issue here in these very Forums:

http://forums.metacritic.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/157108/m/7960072682/p/1

The general argument is basically that people CHOOSE to eat fast food and we shouldn't blame the makers of the products for what people choose to do.

Of course, the same lobby groups raked Eric Schlosser over the coals for his excellent book Fast Food Nation. His book was similarly a commentary on a culture and not a muckraking effort aimed at fastfood. It's a good book.

quote:

Originally posted by Filmore Holmes:
It only proved the depth of American ignorance committed to THE LIE and that Supersize Me is the real deal.

Be careful with attaching anti-American sentiment to a movie that's self-serving to the documentary maker.

quote:

Bowling For Morgan was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen. He completely missed the point of Super. Morgan got as much exercise as the average American and ordered what typical American's eat. That Bowling dumbass only drank Diet Coke and ate sallads while mocking every segment of Super but with nothing to back it up (wow, he got a 3 year old to call Morgan a clown...impressive. And ooooh, he couldn't get an interview with Morgan the week Morgan was in Brazil). I feel dumber now having watched that. It only proved the depth of American ignorance committed to THE LIE and that Supersize Me is the real deal.

What Lie?

I don't get why people still won't take responsibilty, no one made morgan supersize his meal. He chose to do so. The other guy who says that there are not healthy fast food choices for him, Mcdonalds had salads on their menus for years people just don't buy them, in fact before this movie came out they practically bribed people to get their healthy salad by giving them a free pedometor. To me this is an insult, I have been big all my life and don't even eat much fast food. I stay away from Mcdonald's because I don't and never liked their food.

So this is what you guys are agreeing with him on this?
The average overweight american:
Eats unhealthy meals
Doesn't excersize
and doesn't sleep properly

There many people who are overweight because, they suffer from Hypothryoidism, may have tumors, or some other medical condition that helps them keeps weight one. Shoot an Asthmatic taking prednesome can swell up because of the medician.

He fails to address that two of the people in the movie, the son of Baskin from the ice cream company and the Big Mac guy were also slim. Eating unhealthy does not mean that you will be overweight, it simply means that you are unhealthy. Sure you know that there are people out here that eat like piggs and don't gain weight because of their metabolism.

He does not mention that many of the same school districts cut physicall education and extra-circular activites that would help children lose weight because of funding, nor does he address the fact that millions of american spend lots of money on diets programs, fitness equipement, and gyms and still don't lose there weight.

THIS IS THE THING THAT REALLY DISTRUBS ME: PEOPLE DO NOT REALLIZE THAT OUR JOBS IN THIS COUNTRY ARE MUCH MORE SESSILE THAN THE JOBS THAT OUR PARENTS AND GRANDPARENTS HAD. You sit behind a computer and answer a phone all day unlike working in a plant where you had to be on your feet all day. Could this also be a reason why people are more unhealthy Mr Morgan? They are inactive.

People have poor eating habits but it does not mean that we all decided to eat unhealthy meals all day.

IF morgan wanted to be correct. Then he would get up in the morning and skip breakfast. The race to work, sit behind his desk all day, eat some candy bar or something and get home practically starving and pigg out on dinner.

During this process: his metabolism never gets started until dinner, will be relatively low the entire day and then he would "make up" his calories by eating a rediculously heavy meal and the end of the day and go to sleep. No wonder he would gain weight or be unhealthy. Many people I know do this. Not too many people would even have the time to go to Mcdonalds every morning, noon, and night to eat their meals or for that matter any other fast food chain.

Notice I did not mention that the stress of your job and family would have something to with how you feel and that could make you feel even more unhealthy.

My problem with Super Size Me was that it reflected a growing sentiment among Americans: blame corporations before you blame yourself; it is always somebody else's fault. There is no personal responsibility anymore: fat people are fat because they don't eat right and/or they don't exercise enough, not because of fast food companies. The responsibility of fast food companies is to sell as much of their product for as much profit as possible, nothing more nothing less.

We heard something similar in the "Olestra in Chips" thread that PE linked earlier. Check it out, you might have something to add, good debates are something that I enjoy.

On the movie, I haven't seen it. The idea seemed redundant so I didn't bother renting it.

quote:

Originally posted by paxsoprano:
My problem with Super Size Me was that it reflected a growing sentiment among Americans: blame corporations before you blame yourself; it is always somebody else's fault. There is no personal responsibility anymore: fat people are fat because they don't eat right and/or they don't exercise enough, not because of fast food companies. The responsibility of fast food companies is to sell as much of their product for as much profit as possible, nothing more nothing less.

I certainly think what you're saying is correct here, pax. I don't think the documentary was merely saying "blame McDonalds"...it was supposed to be a wake up call to those who eat a bad diet, fail to exercise, and wonder why they're fat. I never heard Spurlock proclaim that fast food restaurants should be shut down. It was an exaggerated exercise in what can happen if you live a sedentary lifestyle and eat a lot of crap. Interviews with Spurlock showed that his was a fairly tongue-in-cheek approach to the whole project.

I don't like the "blame corporations" attitude very much...but I'm also not sure that the "the market is all good and self-correcting...corporations should do everything they can get away with to maximize profits" attitude is really the best one for society, overall.