# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The film-maker put on 25lbs during his burger-and-fries diet

Super Size Me, which follows a film-maker as he eats only McDonald's fast food for an entire month, opens in the UK on Friday.
Doctors warned Morgan Spurlock his health was at risk as he munched his way through dozens of Big Macs and Chicken McNuggets and slurped gallons of cola.

The fit and healthy US documentary maker put on 25lbs and was urged by medical experts to call an end to his 30-day fast food diet.

Spurlock ate nothing but McDonald's food for 30 days

At turns informative, shocking and black-humoured, the film asks searching questions of the US food industry and suggests a healthier alternative is available with political will.
Spurlock becomes so unwell during the film that at one stage his doctor comments that the diet has affected his health to the extent that his liver "is turning into pate".

Spurlock is seen describing himself feeling ill and low in energy, while medical concerns are raised about his blood pressure and cholesterol.

McDonald's has called for a "balanced debate" on the film

The film's release has already prompted McDonald's to release a statement defending its menus and denouncing Spurlock's movie as "unrealistic".
It took out adverts in five British newspapers saying its food should be eaten as "part of a balanced diet".

In March this year the company announced it planned to scrap its supersize meals by December, and planned to introduce more lower-calorie and lower-fat options.

McDonald's has faced legal action over obesity in the US, where one group of children claimed its food was responsible for health problems.

But it has been robust in defending the "nutritional value" of its food, and has called for a "balanced debate" on Spurlock's movie.

In its UK newspaper advert it pointed out that an average customer would take more than six years to eat as much as Spurlock.
"The film is slick, well-made and yes, somewhat annoyingly, doesn't portray McDonald's in the most favourable light," the advert said.
"We've always been famous for our hamburgers and our fries, but we wouldn't suggest that they are anything other than part of a balanced diet.

"What we do agree with is its core argument - if you eat too much and do too little, it's bad for you. What we don't agree with is the idea that eating at McDonald's is bad for you."

The company highlighted details of its salads and fruit bags, which it said had led to a 10% worldwide sales increase.

What we don't agree with is the idea that eating at McDonald's is bad for you

It has also gone on the offensive In Australia - where the film broke box office records for a documentary - accusing Spurlock of "distortion".

His movie won the best director award at the prestigious independent US movie festival Sundance.

But McDonald's has said it does not expect it to have an impact in the UK because "there's nothing new here".

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Supersize debate on fast food film

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The film-maker put on 25lbs during his burger-and-fries diet Super Size Me, which follows a film-maker as he eats only McDonald's fast food for an entire month, opens in the UK on Friday. Doctors warned Morgan Spurlock his health was at risk as he munched his way through dozens of Big Macs and Chicken McNuggets and slurped gallons of cola.

# data[].attributes.body
Can you explain the title?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The United States is about to undergo a paradigm shift in the way it eats, and the success of Morgan Spurlock's super-entertaining, super-disgusting documentary Super Size Me will have something to do with it. With any luck, Spurlock's odyssey will do for patrons of McDonald's, Burger King, KFC, etc., what scientists did for the sociopathic Alex (Malcolm McDowell) in A Clockwork Orange (1971) when they pried his eyes wide open, administered a drug to induce nausea, and forced him to ogle hours and hours of violence. It will put you off your fast food-or, at least, slow you down. Just the thought of a Quarter Pounder With Cheese and a large fries makes me gag these days. And not too long ago, I was addicted to the stuff.

Yes, I'm one of those annoying reformed junkies-but hear me out. While you probably think of movie critics as lean, suave, and athletic bon vivants, I was anything but. After late screenings in Times Square, I was hitting the McDonald's outlets pretty hard. There I'd be, at 11 p.m., chowing down under the harsh fluorescents with all the other pale and blobby souls, feeling more and more disgusted with myself after every bite. On those nights, I learned the true meaning of "reflux." And from a comfortable 160 pounds (I'm 5-feet-9), I shot up to a shamefaced (and triple-chinned) 220. I don't blame McDonald's-I blame my indulgent self. But as all my hungry fat cells yodeled, "Feed me! Feed me!" those fast-food outlets beckoned. What they offered was the most efficient delivery system for fat, salt, sugar, and carbs known to man. And I deserved a break today.

For Super Size Me, Spurlock came up with a magnificent stunt-but one that seemed to leap from the collective unconscious of our fast-food nation. He would spend a month eating nothing but McDonald's food, three meals a day, and if they asked if he wanted it supersized, he'd say, "Yes, I would!" But only if they asked. In the movie's first gross-out set piece, Spurlock goes to the drive-through window, orders a Double Quarter Pounder With Cheese meal, supersizes it, and settles in for an orgy.

This is the American dream, isn't it? To sit in your oversized car (where you don't have to make eye contact with anyone) and eat an oversized meal of crap. Sure, there are nutrients in there somewhere, but not in proportion to calories, sugar, and sodium. And after you've inhaled that stuff (it goes down fast-there's nothing really to masticate), it makes you feel bad. Spurlock mentions McBloat and McGas, among other symptoms. A few minutes later, he pukes out the window, with the cameraman helpfully leaning over to show the vomit on the pavement.

Spurlock consumed way too many calories-5,000 a day-even for his fit, 6-foot-2-inch frame. But no one, least of all the doctors who agreed to monitor him, expected the scale of what happened next: a gain of 25 pounds and a cholesterol leap of 65 points. His liver filled up with fat. He was depressed, exhausted, and, according to his vegan-chef girlfriend, semi-impotent. On camera, his doctors regard him the way they would a man on the verge of a massive coronary. They tell him to get to a hospital at the first sign of chest pains-and it's handy because, as Spurlock shows us, there are hospitals that have a McDonald's right in them.

We can choose to blame or not blame McDonald's (Spurlock chose the company simply because it's the most visible, with almost 100 outlets on the island of Manhattan alone), but the statistics he cites are hard to refute: Americans eat out for an average of 40 percent of their meals; portion sizes have ballooned; and two-thirds of all Americans are considered overweight-i.e., with a body mass index above 25. Half of those can be termed "obese." It begins early; in the course of his monthlong regime, Spurlock hits the road and visits public schools, where processed foods, sugary soft drinks, and french fries are the rule rather than the exception. Many junk-food-makers welcome the chance to hook kids at an early age.

In the course of his absurd and manifestly self-destructive exercise, Spurlock uses sprightly animation to take us through the life-cycle of a Chicken McNugget-a "McFrankenstein creation." He visits McDonald's outlets in Los Angeles and Houston, the city with proportionately the fattest inhabitants. He gives time to a man who eats several Big Macs a day and is not overweight. (The guy passes up the fries, though.) He talks to doctors, lawyers, nutritionists, ex-Surgeon General David Satcher, and a food-industry rep-everyone but McDonald's, which won't return his calls.

After the movie created a stir at this year's Sundance festival, McDonald's did weigh in. The company announced the end of supersizing-and claimed that this decision had nothing to do with Spurlock. Fer sher. It has since issued a statement calling Super Size Me "a super-sized distortion of the quality, choice, and variety available at McDonald's." Uh, do they mean those salads? The statement goes on to say that the film is not about McDonald's but "Spurlock's decision to act irresponsibly-a gimmick to make a film."

Is it a gimmick? Sure-a terrific gimmick. Did he act irresponsibly? Yes, but what he did is not as far outside the realm of mainstream American behavior as some would have you believe. Is he a hustler? Maybe. Spurlock is not the most attractive personality: He once made a gross-out reality dare show for MTV. And I think he makes a mistake in the film by putting so much emphasis on lawyers suing McDonald's on behalf of obese people. That's an easy target for libertarians and those "free-enterprise" groups that are largely funded by the food industry. You're going to hear a lot of broadsides from organizations like the Center for Consumer Freedom and the National Review, which has already likened the crusade against calorie-laden fast food and its purveyors to that other left-liberal scam, global warming. Next thing they'll be telling us that cigarettes cause cancer.

No, I don't think anyone should sue McDonald's. Just stop buying its food. I did, and I lost 60 pounds last year-I'm back down to 160. I also cut down on carbs (but not carrots, apples, and other Atkins bugaboos) and beer, and I started running again. My dieting advice is to begin by seeing Super Size Me -a vital shock to the system. It will prop your eyes wide open.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The United States is about to undergo a paradigm shift in the way it eats, and the success of Morgan Spurlock's super-entertaining, super-disgusting documentary Super Size Me will have something to do with it.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Independent Critic - "Super Size Me" Review

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Independent Critic offers movie reviews, interviews, and festival coverage from award-winning writer and film journalist Richard Propes.

# data[].attributes.body
What do you think now?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Most people thought the documentary SuperSize Me was an expose of what the fast food industry was doing to waistlines around the world. But comedian and former health writer Tom Naughton didn't buy it. Can you actually lose weight on a diet of burgers and fries?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Is SuperSize Documentary Really Accurate?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Most people thought the documentary SuperSize Me was an expose of what the fast food industry was doing to waistlines around the world. But comedian and former health writer Tom Naughton didn't buy it. Can you actually lose weight on a diet of burgers and fries?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Cert 12A

The Onion website has already had the definitive comment on this anti-burger movie with its headline: "Michael Moore kicking himself for not taping his last 300 trips to McDonald's." To add to the important book on the subject, Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation, documentary-maker Morgan Spurlock has produced a very funny and disquieting film about McDonald's in the Mooresque style, complete with graphics, wacky voiceovers, sympathetic interviews with experts and unreturned phone calls from evasive flacks. Spurlock never tries for a big showdown with a corporate kingpin. He's got a much better idea than that. An idea so brilliantly and horribly simple, an idea of such gonzo genius, that it's extraordinary no one's tried it before.

For 30 days, he will eat nothing but McDonald's - breakfast, lunch, dinner, everything - even water has to be the bottled variety that comes over the counter. He undertakes to sample a representative range of the fare on offer, and, most crucially, commits himself to accepting the "super size" portion whenever offered, which is basically a kind of Billy Bunter upgrade for greedy pigs. Kafka had his hunger artist. Spurlock is a gross-out-gobble artist: for 30 days, he will endure a McLent, a fast of fast food. At the end of it all, he looks like he could pickle himself in a tank and sell himself to Charles Saatchi for a lot of money.

Unsportingly, McDonald's have now cancelled their super size policy, denying it is a result of this film, and have launched a counter-attack, ramping up their unconvincing and unattractive "healthy" options and have even taken out ads congratulating Spurlock, presumably through clenched teeth, on how entertaining he's been.

The counter-arguments are plain. Isn't it obvious you're not supposed to eat at McDonald's all the time? If you ate nothing but organic apples, wouldn't that be bad for you, too? Yes of course. But McDonald's is technically described as a "restaurant", and eating at comparable fast-food outlets all the time, or nearly all the time, is what millions of first-world consumers increasingly do. Obesity is on the rise in America, in tandem with the growth of the zillion-dollar convenience food industry. Spurlock's experiment isn't rigorous nutritional or sociological science, but it's a revealing motif for what is happening. And the fact that he's actually gone through with it is outrageously funny.

Spurlock's self-abuse - it's the only way of putting it - begins with a drumroll of impending doom from his complaining intestines, as he sits in his car grimly munching his way through the first Super Size takeout bag comprising what looks like everything but the horns and tail. "I'm getting some McHiccups," he moans, "I'm getting some McGurgles." Then he throws up out of the driver's side window. But as the days of gastronomic nightmare tick by, a strange thing happens, a horrible metaphor for what happens to the nation's palate. Spurlock gets used to it. He keeps eating and he doesn't throw up. He gains weight, and gets very pale, and a worried doctor tells him his liver is like an alcoholic's - as WC Fields once put it, it looks like it could win first prize in a Charleston competition.

But Spurlock doesn't become Mr Creosote. What he becomes is depressed. And a fix of McDonald's is the only thing that will bring him up out of it - temporarily. His movie is very interesting on fast food's weird drug-like qualities. Regular customers are called "heavy users" and Spurlock, the heaviest user imaginable, becomes listless, lethargic. You can almost sense his IQ dwindling. His grotesque 30-day experiment is interspersed with interviews which show how the industry is insinuating itself into the school meal market. These were presumably recorded before the great gorgefest began, because by the end Spurlock doesn't look like he can face any task more taxing than his three zombie schleps to the golden arches.

He looks like John Self, the hero of Martin Amis's 1984 novel Money - which now looks more brilliantly prescient than ever - addicted to the grottiest fast food, pornography, and all manner of denaturing convenience gratification. Now that Michael Moore has done guns and Spurlock has dealt with burgers, the global explosion of internet porn is surely a subject ripe for this kind of treatment. And then, of course, there's the cigarette industry, and its unacknowledged reliance on children smoking and becoming the all-important heavy users of tomorrow.

If only McDonald's wasn't so tasty. This is the only thing preventing me from fully endorsing Spurlock's denunciation. It's easy to forget just how horrible burgers were in this country before the American invasion in the 1970s. I remember the first time I had a Burger King in the US in 1977, having previously only tasted the concrete turds that used to be on offer in the dire Wimpy Bar restaurant in Watford. It was an epiphany comparable to one experienced by my father, during the second world war when he realised that GIs had uniforms of superior material and cut than those of our officers: America was better than us! But that was before McDonald's was so ubiquitous, before its ubiquity was so dreary and depressing, before we knew what we know now. McDonald's is an occasional guilty pleasure. But now it's guiltier than ever.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Cert 12A The Onion website has already had the definitive comment on this anti-burger movie with its headline: "Michael Moore kicking himself for not taping his last 300 trips to McDonald's."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Morgan Spurlock's movie, "Super Size Me" won the best director award at the Sundance Film Festival and is now racking up ticket sales unheard of for a low budget documentary.

Watch John Stossel's full report Friday on 20/20 at 10 p.m.

For the film, he eats fast food for 30 days to see what would happen to his health condition. The resulting documentary is earning high praise, and held a spot in the top 10 at the box office for three weeks.

"It's incredible ... unbelievable," Spurlock told ABC News.

Soon after Sundance, McDonald's announced it would stop "super sizing" its offerings, meaning if customers want extra french fries they no longer have the option of upgrading to an extra-large size at a discounted price. They deny it had anything to do with the movie.

"Amazing coincidence, right?" said Spurlock.

One-Month Challenge

When two obese girls sued McDonald's, it gave Spurlock the idea for the movie. The judge threw out the case saying the girls couldn't prove McDonald's made them fat, so Spurlock decided to do his own test.

He ate all of his meals at McDonald's for 30 days straight and filmed it for the documentary "Super Size Me." Whenever they offered to super size his order, he accepted.

Spurlock also cut back on his exercise routine, trying to match what most Americans do. And of course it soon had an effect.

As he said in the movie: "Now's the time of the meal when you start getting the McStomachache. You start getting the McTummy. You get the McGurgles in there. You get the McBrick."

Spurlock Weighs In

On the McDiet, he was eating twice as much as he normally eats - an average of 5,000 calories every day - so no wonder he felt sick.

As the weeks passed, his health worsened. In the film he describes his condition, saying he had trouble breathing, became hot and felt like he was having heart palpitations.

His doctors worried about him. One is quoted in the film telling the director to, "Stop doing what you're doing. You're pickling your liver."

Another doctor suggests he was addicted to the food, because his mood improved every time he ate. Spurlock said he would get headaches that went away the minute he started to eat the food.

After 30 days of the experiment, he says he gained 24½ pounds, his liver turned to fat and his cholesterol shot up 65 points.

McDonald's Influence

But wait a second; is it really the fault of McDonald's? Do we blame Ford because cars lead us to avoid exercise? Do we blame ABC because TV invites us to be couch potatoes?

We spoke to some filmgoers who saw the movie and blamed McDonald's for Spurlock's weight gain.

One man told us the corporation is wrong for putting "stuff in their food that makes you want to eat it over and over again." A woman said advertising by McDonald's is influencing our habits.

And yet Spurlock told us he's not looking to place blame. "I don't point the finger at McDonald's and blame them for the obesity epidemic ... McDonald's is iconic of the problem," said Spurlock.

Personal vs. Corporate Responsibility

In "Super Size Me," Spurlock asks where personal responsibility ends and corporate responsibility begins.

We can debate corporate responsibility, but the important point is that personal responsibility never ends. That's why "Super Size Me" is making some people mad.

We talked with two adults who have nothing to do with McDonald's Corp., but who think the documentary sends the wrong message.

"Making a film like this doesn't help anybody," said 49-year-old Soso Whaley. "It just allows people to say, 'It's McDonald's fault or it's fast food, or it's a hamburger. That's why I'm fat.' "

Whaley did her own 30-day test. The result? The New Hampshire resident lost 10 pounds and her cholesterol dropped 40 points from 237 to 197 during a month of fast food meals. She said after the diet her liver was healthy and "in general, I felt pretty darn good."

How did Whaley lose so much weight? She didn't pig out the way Spurlock did.

"I might have a McGriddle sandwich with bacon, egg and cheese and some orange juice. For lunch I might have a salad ... dinner, well maybe I'd be in the mood for a Big N' Tasty," said Whaley.

She ate fewer than 2,000 calories a day.

California resident Chazz Weaver ate as much as Spurlock did, up to 5,000 calories a day. After 30 days Weaver lost eight pounds, going from 222 to 214 and his HDL cholesterol level improved by 80 percent.

The difference between Spurlock and Weaver was exercise. Weaver works out an hour and 15 minutes a day. "Could somebody eat McDonald's every single day and lose weight? Yes," said Weaver.

Film 'Rigged'?

I told Spurlock about their weight loss. He pointed out that they ate less and exercised, which is something "no Americans do." I then told Spurlock I thought the film was rigged because he bought the fattiest foods.

What if you went to the finest French restaurant and took in 5,000 calories a day, wouldn't the same thing happen?

Spurlock replied: "I don't know. Maybe you should make that film."

Maybe I will. Give Me a Break.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'Super Size Me' Carries Weight With Critics

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Morgan Spurlock's movie, "Super Size Me" won the best director award at the Sundance Film Festival and is now racking up ticket sales unheard of for a low budget documentary. Watch John Stossel's full report Friday on 20/20 at 10 p.m. For the film, he eats fast food for 30 days to see what...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Decomposition Of McDonald's Burgers And Fries.

# data[].attributes.body
New York Times

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Mr. Spurlock, originally from West Virginia, works in the good-natured, regular-guy populist style of documentary rabble-rousing pioneered by Michael Moore. He is a bit less confrontational than Mr. Moore (as well as thinner), but he similarly relishes letting polite, well-scrubbed corporate flacks entangle themselves in bureaucratic doublespeak. In this case, everyone in the food industry seems to want nothing more than to educate consumers, especially young ones, to make good choices.

Anyone who has watched commercial children's television -- where the majority of the ads hawk food of dubious nutritional merit -- has seen such education in action. There is a funny, revealing sequence in which Mr. Spurlock goes to several McDonald's restaurants in search of posters and handouts with nutritional information and discovers that they are difficult to find and sometimes not available at all. There is a heartbreaking moment when an overweight girl worries that she will never lose weight because she can't afford to eat two sandwiches a day from Subway, the diet that made Jared Fogle into the chain's favorite spokesman.

There are also interviews (some conducted over cheeseburgers and soft drinks) with nutritionists, lawyers and David Satcher, the former surgeon general of the United States, all of whom raise alarm about heart disease, juvenile diabetes and other scourges of a society built on cheap, convenient and abundant calories.

The arguments in ''Super Size Me'' will be familiar to readers of Eric Schlosser's best-selling ''Fast Food Nation,'' and like that book, Mr. Spurlock's film is as much about corporate power as it is about health. His conclusion is that it's us or them, that we should kill McDonald's before McDonald's kills us. This may be a little melodramatic, but it should nonetheless give you pause. In any case, it seems more likely that we will continue to live in a fast-food world, perhaps more warily (and more queasily) in the wake of Mr. Spurlock's experience. His movie, which opens nationally today, goes down easy and takes a while to digest, but its message is certainly worth the loss of your appetite.

SUPER SIZE ME

Directed by Morgan Spurlock; director of photography, Scott Ambrozy; edited by Stela Gueorguieva and Julie (Bob) Lombardi; music by Steve Horowitz and Michael Parrish; produced by Mr. Spurlock and The Con; released by Roadside Attractions and Samuel Goldwyn Films. Running time: 96 minutes. This film is not rated.

WITH: Morgan Spurlock, Ronald McDonald, Dr. Daryl Isaacs, Dr. Lisa Ganjhu, Dr. Stephen Siegel, Bridget Bennett, Eric Rowley, Alexandra Jamieson and Dr. David Satcher.
Correction: May 12, 2004, Wednesday A film review in Weekend on Friday about ''Super Size Me,'' a documentary on fast food and obesity, attributed a distinction erroneously to Texas, one of the places to which the filmmaker traveled. It is not the largest state in the union; Alaska is. (The most populous state is California.) The review also misstated the type of diabetes associated with poor nutrition and being overweight. It is Type 2; juvenile diabetes is an autoimmune disorder, now known as Type 1.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
FILM REVIEW; When All Those Big Macs Bite Back

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Mr. Spurlock, originally from West Virginia, works in the good-natured, regular-guy populist style of documentary rabble-rousing pioneered by Michael Moore. He is a bit less confrontational than Mr. Moore (as well as thinner), but he similarly relishes letting polite, well-scrubbed corporate flacks entangle themselves in bureaucratic doublespeak.

# data[].attributes.body
Scene when he throws up / vomits

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Super Size Me

Theatrical release poster

Directed by
Morgan Spurlock

Produced by

Morgan Spurlock

Written by

Morgan Spurlock

Starring

Morgan Spurlock
Alexandra Jamieson

Cinematography

Scott Ambrozy

Edited by

Julie "Bob" Lombardi

Distributed by
Samuel Goldwyn Films
Roadside Attractions

98 minutes

Country

United States

Language

English

Budget

$65,000[1][2]

Box office

$22.2 million[2]

Super Size Me is a 2004 American documentary film directed by and starring Morgan Spurlock, an American independent filmmaker. Spurlock's film follows a 30-day period from February 1 to March 2, 2003, during which he ate only McDonald's food. The film documents this lifestyle's drastic effect on Spurlock's physical and psychological well-being, and explores the fast food industry's corporate influence, including how it encourages poor nutrition for its own profit.

Spurlock ate at McDonald's restaurants three times per day, eating every item on the chain's menu at least once. Spurlock consumed an average of 20.9 megajoules or 5,000 kcal (the equivalent of 9.26 Big Macs) per day during the experiment. An intake of around 2,500 kcal within a healthy balanced diet is more generally recommended for a man to maintain his weight. As a result, the then-32-year-old Spurlock gained 11.1 kilograms (24 lb), a 13% body mass increase, increased his cholesterol to 230 mg/dL (6.0 mmol/L), and experienced mood swings, sexual dysfunction, and fat accumulation in his liver. It took Spurlock fourteen months to lose all the weight gained from his experiment using a vegan diet supervised by his then-girlfriend, a chef who specializes in gourmet vegan dishes.

The reason for Spurlock's investigation was the increasing spread of obesity throughout U.S. society, which the Surgeon General has declared "epidemic", and the corresponding lawsuit brought against McDonald's on behalf of two overweight girls, who, it was alleged, became obese as a result of eating McDonald's food (Pelman v. McDonald's Corp., 237 F. Supp. 2d 512). Spurlock argued that although the lawsuit against McDonald's failed (and subsequently many state legislatures have legislated against product liability actions against producers and distributors of "fast food") as well as the McLibel case, much of the same criticism leveled against the tobacco companies applies to fast food franchises whose product is both physiologically addictive and physically harmful.

The documentary was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and won Best Documentary Screenplay from the Writers Guild of America. A comic book related to the movie has been made with Dark Horse Comics as the publisher containing stories based on numerous cases of fast food health scares.

Spurlock released a sequel, Super Size Me 2: Holy Chicken!, in 2017.

As the film begins, Spurlock is in physically above average shape according to his personal trainer. He is seen by three physicians (a cardiologist, a gastroenterologist, and a general practitioner), as well as a nutritionist and a personal trainer. All of the health professionals predict the "McDiet" will have unwelcome effects on his body, but none expected anything too drastic, one citing the human body as being "extremely adaptable". Prior to the experiment, Spurlock ate a varied diet but always had vegan evening meals to appease his girlfriend, Alexandra, a vegan chef. At the beginning of the experiment, Spurlock, who stood 6 feet 2 inches (188 cm) tall, had a body weight of 185 pounds (84 kg).

Experiment

Spurlock followed specific rules governing his eating habits:

He must fully eat three McDonald's meals per day: breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

He must consume every item on the McDonald's menu at least once over the course of the 30 days (he managed this in nine days).

He must only ingest items that are offered on the McDonald's menu, including bottled water. All outside consumption of food is prohibited.

He must Super Size the meal when offered; he cannot request to Super Size on his own.

He will attempt to walk about as much as a typical United States citizen, based on a suggested figure of 5,000 standardized distance steps per day, but he did not closely adhere to this, as he walked more while in New York than in Houston.

On February 1, Spurlock starts the month with breakfast near his home in Manhattan, where there is an average of four McDonald's locations (and 66,950 residents, with twice as many commuters) per square mile (2.6 km²). He aims to keep the distances he walks in line with the 5,000 steps (approximately two miles) walked per day by the average American.

Day 2 brings Spurlock's first (of nine) Super Size meal, at the McDonald's on 34th Street and Tenth Avenue, which is a meal made of a Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese, Super Size French fries, and a 42-ounce Coca-Cola, which takes 22 minutes to eat. He experiences steadily increasing stomach discomfort during the process, and then vomits in the McDonald's parking lot.

After five days Spurlock has gained 9.5 pounds (4.3 kg) (from 185.5 to about 195 pounds). It is not long before he finds himself experiencing depression, and he claims that his bouts of depression, lethargy, and headaches could be relieved by eating a McDonald's meal. His general practitioner describes him as being "addicted". At his second weigh-in, he had gained another 8 pounds (3.6 kg), putting his weight at 203.5 pounds (92.3 kg). By the end of the month he weighs about 210 pounds (95 kg), an increase of about 24.5 pounds (about 11 kg). Because he could only eat McDonald's food for a month, Spurlock refused to take any medication at all. At one weigh-in Morgan lost 1 lb. from the previous weigh-in, and a nutritionist hypothesized that he had lost muscle mass, which weighs more than an identical volume of fat. At another weigh-in, a nutritionist said that he gained 17 pounds (7.7 kg) in 12 days.

Spurlock's girlfriend, Alexandra Jamieson, attests to the fact that Spurlock lost much of his energy and sex drive during his experiment. It was not clear at the time whether or not Spurlock would be able to complete the full month of the high-fat, high- carbohydrate diet, and family and friends began to express concern.

On Day 21, Spurlock has heart palpitations. His internist, Dr. Daryl Isaacs, advises him to stop what he is doing immediately to avoid any serious health problems. He compares Spurlock with the protagonist played by Nicolas Cage in the movie Leaving Las Vegas, who intentionally drinks himself to death in a matter of weeks. Despite this warning, Spurlock decides to continue the experiment.

On March 2, Spurlock makes it to day 30 and achieves his goal. In thirty days, he has "Supersized" his meals nine times along the way (five of which were in Texas, four in New York City). His physicians are surprised at the degree of deterioration in Spurlock's health. He notes that he has eaten as many McDonald's meals as most nutritionists say the ordinary person should eat in 8 years (he ate 90 meals, which is close to the number of meals consumed once a month in an 8-year period).

The documentary's end text states that it took Spurlock 5 months to lose 20.1 pounds (9.1 kg) and another 9 months to lose the last 4.5 pounds (2.0 kg). His then-girlfriend Alex, now his ex-wife, began supervising his recovery with her " detox diet", which became the basis for her book, The Great American Detox Diet.

The movie ends with a rhetorical question, "Who do you want to see go first, you or them?" This is accompanied by a cartoon tombstone, which reads "Ronald McDonald (1954-2012)", which originally appeared in The Economist in an article addressing the ethics of marketing to children.

A short epilogue was added to the film. It showed that the salads can contain even more calories than burgers if the customer adds liberal amounts of cheese and dressing prior to consumption. Also, it described McDonald's discontinuation of the Super Size option six weeks after the movie's premiere, as well as its recent emphasis on healthier menu items such as salads, and the release of the new adult Happy Meal. McDonald's denied that these changes had anything to do with the film.

Super Size Me premiered at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival, where Morgan Spurlock won the Grand Jury Prize for directing the film. The film opened in the U.S. on May 7, 2004, and grossed a total of $11,536,423 worldwide, making it the 22nd highest-grossing documentary film of all time. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, but lost to the film Born into Brothels. It did, however, win the award for Best Documentary Screenplay from the Writers Guild of America.

The film received overall positive reviews from critics and audiences. It holds a 92% "Certified Fresh" rating on the film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes based on 170 reviews, with an average rating of 7.73/10. The consensus calls the film an "entertaining doc about the adverse effects of eating fast food."

Super Size Me received two thumbs up on At the Movies with Ebert and Roeper. Caroline Westbrook for stated that the hype for the documentary was proper "to a certain extent", because of its serious message, and that, overall, the film's "high comedy factor and over-familiarity of the subject matter render it less powerful than other recent documentaries - but it still makes for enjoyable, thought-provoking viewing." One reviewer said "he's telling us something everyone already knows: Fast food is bad for you."

Robert Davis of said the movie accomplished some of its goals and addressed an important topic, but, at the same time, sometimes looked more like a publicity stunt than a documentary. He primarily criticized the dramatic and unscientific approach of Super Size Me, saying Spurlock unnecessarily ate more than he had to and ignored his nutritionist's advice. Davis explained he would have been more interested had the documentary been about trying to eat as healthy as possible at McDonald's: "You could choose low-fat options, but it would be impossible to get enough vegetables and fiber, and the low-fat meal would be incredibly bland, the product of a system that has worked to optimize food delivery and consistency and, in doing so, has invented foods so devoid of flavor that they require dressings, oils, beef tallow and goopy coatings to make them more than just textured blobs. The industry has worked hard to convince consumers that these odd, sweet flavors are not only good but also unique, recognizable parts of a brand. Spurlock doesn't attempt to convey this message, presumably because the affects [] of too few vegetables and too little fiber aren't as dramatic as speedy weight-and-cholesterol gains."

McDonald's UK responded that the author intentionally consumed an average of 5,000 calories per day and did not exercise, and that the results would have been the same regardless of the source of overeating.

Counter-claims

In his reply documentary , Tom Naughton "suggests that Spurlock's calorie and fat counts don't add up" and noted Spurlock's refusal to publish the Super Size Me food log. The Houston Chronicle reports: "Unlike Spurlock, Naughton has a page on his Web site that lists every item (including nutritional information) he ate during his fast-food month." About 1/3 of Spurlock's calories came from sugar. His nutritionist, Bridget Bennett, warned him about his excess intake of sugar from "milkshakes and Cokes". It is revealed toward the end of the movie that over the course of the diet, he consumed "over 30 pounds (14 kg) of sugar, and over 12 pounds (5.4 kg) of fat from their food". About 2000 calories in a lb. of sugar, of nearly 5000 calories consumed per day, accounted for just under 36% percent of his caloric intake.[original research? ]

After eating exclusively at McDonald's for one month, Soso Whaley said, "The first time I did the diet in April 2004, I lost 10 pounds (going from 175 to 165) and lowered my cholesterol from 237 to 197, a drop of 40 points." Of particular note was that she exercised regularly and did not insist on consuming more food than she otherwise would. Despite eating at only McDonald's every day, she maintained her caloric intake at around 2,000 per day.

After John Cisna, a high school science teacher, lost 60 pounds while eating exclusively at McDonald's for 180 days, he said, "I'm not pushing McDonald's. I'm not pushing fast food. I'm pushing taking accountability and making the right choice for you individually... As a science teacher, I would never show Super Size Me because when I watched that, I never saw the educational value in that... I mean, a guy eats uncontrollable amounts of food, stops exercising, and the whole world is surprised he puts on weight? What I'm not proud about is probably 70 to 80 percent of my colleagues across the United States still show Super Size Me in their health class or their biology class. I don't get it."

Six weeks after the film's debut, McDonald's dropped its supersize portions. In the United Kingdom, McDonald's publicized the website, which included a response to and criticisms of the film. In theaters in the UK, the company placed a brief ad in the film's trailers, pointing to the URL and stating, "See what we disagree with. See what we agree with."

Internationally, Super Size Me was a major success in the box office of Australia. McDonald's in Australia responded with an advertising campaign that included three elements: two advertisements for TV and one produced to be shown in movie theaters.

The film was the inspiration for the BBC television series The Supersizers... in which the presenters dine on historical meals and take medical tests to ascertain the impact on their health.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Super Size Me Theatrical release poster Directed by Morgan Spurlock Produced by Morgan Spurlock Written by Morgan Spurlock Starring Morgan Spurlock Alexandra Jamieson Cinematography Scott Ambrozy Edited by Julie "Bob" Lombardi Distributed by Samuel Goldwyn Films Roadside Attractions 98 minutes Country United States Language English Budget $65,000[1] [2] Box office $22.2 million[2] Super Size Me is a 2004 American documentary film directed by and starring Morgan Spurlock, an American independent filmmaker.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Directed by Morgan Spurlock. With Morgan Spurlock, Daryl Isaacs, Chemeeka Walker, Dania Abu-Rmaileh. While examining the influence of the fast food industry, Morgan Spurlock personally explores the consequences on his health of a diet of solely McDonald's food for one month.