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McDonalds the movie: "Supersize Me"


fresco

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While shooting the documentary "Supersize Me: A Film of Epic Proportions" which had its premiere at the Sundance Festival, director Morgan Spurlock spent a month and $850 at McDonalds, consuming everything on the menu, supersizing his meals when offered, taking in 5,000 calories a day, and ballooning by 24 pounds:

http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,590037522,00.html

Arthur Johnson, aka "fresco"
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I did the opposite; in June 2001 I stopped eating fast food (after reading fast food nation) and stopped drinking processed juices (Snapples and the like). By February of 2002 I had lost OVER 40 pounds without changing anything else. My doctor was amazed and thought that I had somehow started taking medicine for my colorestrol (sp), which became dramatically better.

I still eat what I like - pizza, cheeses, meats, heavy sauces, and I can now drink milk again and my IBS is totallly gone. No more heartbburn either. Try it...you'll hate the first month to six weeks because of habits and cravings...then you'll start shedding pounds, looking and feeling better.

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I too gave up fast food after I read Fast Food Nation. And yes, it is hard in the beginning especially if you have kids and it is so easy to run through the drive-thru, etc. But after a couple of weeks I didn't miss it at all and it's been 8 months since I have had fast food (except for one chicken sandwich at Chik-Fil-A).

Just reading that article made me queasy. How that guy could possible eat 90 meals in a row at McDonalds I'll never know. Ah, the sacrifices these artists make!

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from the article:

"And after bingeing on everything Ronald's menu has to offer at least once — and supersizing when offered — the previously trim and healthy Spurlock had spent about $850, gained 24 pounds, raised his once-normal cholesterol levels by 65 points, sent his blood-fat levels out of the Playland roof and, in one of his doctor's words, turned his liver into pate"

I really loved this line about turning one's liver into pate!

While no one loves a good pate more than I, will most decidedly always look at the stuff with this new visual playing in my head .... :rolleyes:

Melissa Goodman aka "Gifted Gourmet"

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The Sundance Film Festival (the 2004 version is still going on as I type this) tends to love films which take a wack at Corporate culture. This year, the attack is from the perspective of a customer--a fast food customer. Filmmaker Morgan Spurlock's film "Super Size Me" mounts a very simple assault--Spurlock ate nothing but McDonald's food for 30 days and filmed this disaster.

Here's the general Sundance Festival Index page at IMDB. Information about "Super Size Me" is under the January 20th heading (which as of today, Jan. 21, is still the top item--as well as being referenced from the IMDB front page)

Reuter's has also posted a glowing review.. Much more detail in this one.

Also, a wild guess (none of the articles cite it, and Google couldn't find it) led me to hypothicize that the filmmaker might have been smart enough to reserve the name of his film on the Internet... and he did. http://www.supersizeme.com/ is the official site for the film.

{Merged from a different topic into fresco's existing one, at tommy's er... "suggestion"... Yes, I got lazy and didn't use the search engine. Grrrrr! But there are some new articles and web links above.}

Edited by jhlurie (log)

Jon Lurie, aka "jhlurie"

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Is it just me, or has there always been something nightmarishly creepy about Ronald McDonald?

It's not just you, believe me. Ronald is a clown, a terrifying hamburger

eating clown.

Look, if the genesis of Ronald McDonald was with Willard Scott, of course he's creepy.

I wonder if eGullet has any members who went to Sundance. Hey, c'mon... it's at least possible.

Jon Lurie, aka "jhlurie"

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Super Size Me just won best direction for a documentary at the Sundance Film Festival. The director/subject announced that it will debut on A&E TV, as well as play in theaters.

Edited by bpearis (log)

"If it's me and your granny on bongos, then it's a Fall gig'' -- Mark E. Smith

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I'm not impressed.

In order to put on 24 pounds within a month he clearly had to stuff his face with food he didn't want, even when he wasn't hungry, which was probably almost all the time.

Then he "had to" do some sort of a cleansing routine? Spare me. He has learned nothing from the experience but how to make a good documentary.

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I think a lot of those calories came from beverages. A super-sized Coke has 410 calories -- it doesn't take too many of those to put on some pounds. I'm sure he didn't feel like eating a big meal three times a day every day, but then if he ate only when he was hungry, he wouldn't have a documentary. Of course, this was never intended to be a serious documentary. His website describes it as satrical and tongue-in-cheek.

Edited by TPO (log)

Tammy Olson aka "TPO"

The Practical Pantry

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Given the popularity of Fast Food Nation, you'd think a distributor would pick it up to at least make the art house/college theater rounds.

Ultimately it's ridiculous. A Big Mac, Supersized Fries, and a Supersized Coke would be 1600 calories, approximately. Three meals a day of that would be way overload. You could gain half a pound of fat a day, easily. And without vitamin supplements....

But McDonald's is correct. They have balanced options. Change your breakfast to an Egg McMuffin and large orange juice and you've lowered your calories by about 1000 calories a day. Change your lunch or dinner to a Grilled McChicken and a side salad and you've lowered your daily calories by another 1200 calories. Suddenly, you could actually lose weight depending on your exercise regiment. 2600 calories a day for three meals isn't that bad. Change those lunch and dinner sodas to diet and you'll drop another 800 calories a day for a total of 1800. Most people could lose weight on that with moderate exercise.

If I were McDonald's, I'd pay someone (I'll do it) to eat all their food from McDonald's and lose weight. All they'd have to do is eat the salads with low-cal dressing for two meals and then eat grilled chicken sandwiches and a side salad for dinner. Diet soda only. You could even throw in one of those fruit and yogurt shake things or a baked apple pie and probably be under 1200 calories a day pretty easily.

btw, I lost over 100 lbs a while ago by limiting my calories and exercising, but then I started gaining weight again, not because of fast food (I go to fast food less than once a month), but rather because I became obsessed with cooking and fine dining.

PS Did anyone ever see that web log where a guy gave himself athlete's foot and incubated it on purpose over months? It was disgusting. This reminds me of that.

Edited by ExtraMSG (log)
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I could see it. You have a guy dressed up as a fat version of Ronald, like in that parody poster. You document him eating McD's salads and such (sans dressing, of course... we are cheating) and drinking Diet Cokes for a month. End of month... thin Ronald. Thin Ronald turns to camera and mocks the Subway diet by saying "take that Jared, you fat bastard! And you too, Spurlock..." :biggrin:

Jon Lurie, aka "jhlurie"

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[

I wonder if eGullet has any members who went to Sundance.  Hey, c'mon... it's at least possible.

I just came back from 2 weeks @ Sundance - "Super Size Me" had great buzz all over town. Posters of the film featured the filmmaker with his mouth stuffed with french fries and were plastered everywhere.

Sundance does tend to love films that take a serious swipe at corporate America - ironic because there is a huge amount of product placement and corporate sponsorship that surrounds the festival. This year I was brought in as the chef of the Columbia House Cafe-that's the same Columbia House that has the DVD club. Other sponsors involved in our events were Phillips, who brought in plasma screens for the cafe and set up a lounge filled with equipment, and Silk, soy milk manufacturers who contributed a number of items in exchange for product placement. And that was just for the cafe.

Whole Foods donated organic food for the ICM party of 500 people that I did.

Jay-Z's company Rocawear supplied varsity jackets for all my waitstaff as well as guests for "The Woodsman" (new Kevin Bacon movie).

The amount of corporate swag given away is staggering. When I cooked at Sundance for Reebok in 2002, I was covered head to toe in labels -- to the point where I was tempted to write on my chef coat, "Monica May, Corporate Slut".

As for movies, I rarely get to see them because my schedule is so demanding. This year I managed to sneak away for a midnight screening of the documentary "Chisholm '72 - Unbought and Unbossed", about Shirley Chisholm's unsuccessful bid for the Democratic presidential nomination . It was a righteous piece of filmmaking about an amazing, audacious woman who did not step aside, despite pressure from every political group within her party. Shirley Chisholm didn't wear corporate swag - she was way too cool. When this film gets picked up , please see it - especially in this election year, it's quite an indictment of how politics are played.

Two other films to see - "Riding Giants", Stacy Peralta's sequel to "Dogtown and Z-Boys", about the origins of surf culture in Hawaii; and Bernardo Bertollucci's new film "The Dreamers, about an incestuous relationship between a brother and sister and their American friend, set against the student riots of Paris in '68. I catered the breakfast which Bertollucci - from live feed in London - talked about this film to reporters and it was such a pleasure listening to this man - A Maestro ! - talk about filmmaking it became my favorite event of the time I was there. For me, these are the really good percs of my job.

We need to find courage, overcome

Inaction is a weapon of mass destruction

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Just another Micheal Moore wannabe.

What's wrong with that?

You could say the same of about 75% of the directors in Hollywood at the moment - they're all references of someone who's come before them.

Imitation has always been the sincerest form of flattery in this town.

We need to find courage, overcome

Inaction is a weapon of mass destruction

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