#1 Cheap Super Size Me Reviews
Special Price Today Go To Store!! (Limited Time Offer)
With this 'notorious' film, Morgan Spurlock joins Michael Moore in making documentaries that are informative, thought-provoking, personal, controversial and commercially successful. I wish more people would understand that next-to-last term, controversial. It is what gets more documentaries like this made because it is what gets people to view documentaries like this.
The film is really an inter-twining of two lines of development: (1) the gimmick of eating nothing but McD's meals for a month and (2) a fact-based approach to an argument over the influence of the food industry combined with American's bad food choices, all of which amounts to an epidemic of obesity and bad health.
As for (1), many have picked up right away that Spurlock is stacking the deck in favor of him gaining weight rapidly by eating so many french fries, large sandwiches, and sugary softdrinks (which are enormous, the likes of which we don't see here in Japan, yet). I argue it is the fries and high-fructose corn syrup in the drinks that really make his experimental diet so awful. And yet people are missing the points he makes with such choices: Yes, many people do go to McD's and eat like this, day after day. For on thing, the menu is so limited, and there is very little 'green' food on it. Also, McD's actually promoted super-sized meals to improve their financial bottom line--they are more profitable. And even if you don't choose large sizes, the company promotes sets, which automatically make you buy a profitable sandwhich, an even more profitable order of fries, and an even yet more profitable soft drink.Moreover, substituting aspartame- and sucralose-laden diet drinks might be even more risky for your health. Finally, by the middle of the film we see the film-maker is headed into big trouble with this McD's diet, and yet by the end of the film, as bad as things got, he still looks like he is in better shape than most of America. One more note, some have also pointed out the unfairness of him eliminating most exercise except necessary walking, but again they miss the point: many Americans get almost no exercise, and it is the people who live in the rural and suburban areas who get the least, which is helping to cause the obesity epidemic among these people. Moreover, the guy is also making the argument that a diet like this will make you feel so awful, you won't have the energy to exercise.
Now about the (2) line of development--the expose' of the food industry and the bad food choices Americans face and give in to. I wish he had expanded it even more because clearly he, his small crew and their limited resources did a better job than anything you are going to see from CNN and Dr. Gupta! If you combine this film with 'King Corn', you can learn an awful lot about what is actually going on. I wish Michael Moore had added material like this to 'Sicko', since one reason why so many Americans are sick is the bad diet over many years.
This film is definitely worth watching, and we should be glad that it has drawn so much attention to the problems of food and obesity, not just in America, but in the developed and affluent parts of the developing world (more and more people are eating like and looking like Americans, and that is not good). I'd like to see someone make a film about using food stamps and shopping for food in a poor neighborhood of an major urban area--combined with a small town somewhere. Then maybe those who are luckier wouldn't be so quick to judge overweight Americans.
Super Size Me Overview
Documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock makes himself a test subject in this documentary about the commercial food industry. After eating a diet of McDonald's fast food three times a day for a month straight Spurlock proves the physical and mental effects of consuming fast food. Spurlock also provides a look at the food culture in America through it's schools corporations and politics. "Super Size Me" is a movie that sheds a new light on what has become one of our nation's biggest health problems: obesity.System Requirements:Running Time: 100 Min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. Rating: PG-13 UPC: 043396085435 Manufacturer No: 08543
Morgan's Doctors Don't Get It. - T. Knew - St. Louis, MO
Apparently, Doctors are Stupid!
------------------------------------------
As I'm finally watching this film for the first time, and they make some decent points, but for all the wrong reasons. He attacks, on multiple instances, companies that produce sugary products, but when they talk about his health, they always avert to his "high-fat" diet. I'm not even a doctor, and I could tell, from looking at his blood work that he was sucking down sugar, more specifically, high fructose corn syrup. OF COURSE a bunch of HFCS is gonna make you store fat, raise your trigs, raise uric acid, and your cholesterol numbers. The dummy doctors, however, all seem to be bent on demonizing the fat. Also amusing, the bearded doctor repeatedly compares the liver damage to alcoholism, which is COMPLETELY inline with what Robert H. Lustig says HFCS will do to you.
Extreme Case is Right
------------------------------------------
I wonder if Spurlock would have achieved the same results if he would have swapped his milkshakes for diet cola, and his cokes for water, and not done the deserts. Of course he wouldn't have, but then again, he wouldn't have gotten anywhere close to the near 5,000 calories per day that he was consuming. Spurlock wasn't eating typical meals in his three meal a day binge. Dude was throwing in sugary sodas AND milkshakes with meals, (show me one person who has ever done that.) Deserts would have had to been every day. And he only supersized 9 times? How much extra crap, (as in: SUGAR,) did you add on top of your 3 "squares" a day?
The Only Redemption
------------------------------------------
The only aspect of the film I can get with is when he addresses what kids are eating in school, (not, however, the nonsense about food peddling to kids.) School diet plans are a joke, but that's partially due to the FDA and USDA making dumb choices like calling Ketchup a serving of vegetables. I would have liked this movie more if it was an attack on school nutrition and not hopelessly attacking fast food, and for the wrong reason no less. I especially liked the schools that kicked the soda out!
Summation:
I really thought it was interesting that he made so many arguments about all these companies and their sugary products, but every time he got in front of the doctors they only talked about his fat intake. ESPECIALLY considering that his blood work showed tell tale signs of excessive glucose/fructose intake. Then again, what do I know, I'm no doctor. Maybe I should look those guys up and send them a copy of Good Calories, Bad Calories: Fats, Carbs, and the Controversial Science of Diet and Health (Vintage), or direct them to the youtube video that spells out how fructose does exactly what is indicated by his bloodwork.
No comments:
Post a Comment