Note: This entry was originally only published in my Live Journal due to a technical problem on this site. This review was written on June 12, 2004 but was not published on this site until June 26, 2004.
Supersize Me is a good film. It's gotten a lot of criticism for being misleading. After seeing the film, I don't really think that's the case. It's definitely worth seeing no matter what opinion you hold about the premise. It's an entertaining film.
The basic premise is that filmmaker Morgan Spurlock eats 3 meals a day from McDonalds for 30 days. He also gets all of his desserts and snacks from the Golden Arches. He doesn't eat or drink anything that doesn't come from McDonalds. He even bought all of his water from McDonalds. He also changed other aspects of his lifestyle. He used a pedometer to reduce his activity level to one that is closer to the average American. Thus, he took cabs and drove a car when he usually would have walked. He also stopped taking vitamins.
He ate everything available on the menu at least once. So he didn't just eat Double Quarter Pounders. He also only supersized when he was asked if he wanted to do so.
Because of this diet he suffered liver problems, breathing difficulties, sexual dysfunction, etc. His cholesterol, weight, triglycerides, blood sugar, blood pressure all went up. But what was really scary was that he seemed to be becoming addicted to the food. He claimed he had headaches that didn't stop until he ate at McDonalds again (Probably due to caffeine or sugar addiction).
Many people are criticizing this film because it isn't "fair." No, it's not completely balanced, but other views are shown. They even show Don Gorske, the man who eats two Big Macs every day. He hasn't gotten fat nor has he been diagnosed with serious health problems. They also show Jared Fogle who gained fame by losing a lot of weight by eating at Subway (a fast food chain).
There are several ways that the film's experiment could have been improved. First of all there should have been several different people doing the same experiment but each taking a different approach. Subject #1 could use Spurlock's method. Subject #2 could eat like Spurlock, but maintain his/her existing excercise program. Subject #3 could eat at McDonalds but specifically try to make healthy choices. Then perform all of the same health checks. This would be a slightly more balanced study. I wouldn't expect that the others would do much better on their diets (even McDonalds salads and yogurt parfaits contain large amounts of refined carbs and saturated fats). Even if they didn't gain weight, they would likely suffer in other ways.
As for the big question of whether or not the big corporations are responsible for poor nutrition and obesity, I'm not sure. They certainly play a part. Especially when you consider that many of these large food producers are also producing the food for our schools and are the producers of the foods we buy at the supermarket. A lot of these foods have preservatives added so the manufacturers cover up the taste of those additives with sugar and saturated fats. This just isn't good for us. Of course, we all have the option to refuse to eat this food. Why don't we refuse to do so?
Posted by alycia at June 12, 2004 01:22 AM