¶ … Supersize Me, Morgan Spurlock undergoes one of the most masochistic eating experiments imaginable, eating only McDonald's food for thirty days. He tracks his mental and physical health throughout the experiment to reveal the drastic ill effects of regular fast food consumption. Both his girlfriend and his doctors are appalled at the rapid changes taking place in Spurlock, not just to his body but to his emotional and sex life as well. The film is engaging, persuasive, and often intentionally nauseating. It critiques American culture while decrying the fast food industry's marketing tactics. The filmmaker wants viewers to feel disgust and revulsion at fast food in general.
Supersize Me reflects growing awareness among Americans about the harmful nature of a diet filled with processed foods and particularly fast foods like McDonalds. The film is one of many that illustrate the power of the media to promote positive change, counteracting and subverting the way the media has traditionally been used as a tool to manipulate consumers. As Gimenez & Shattuck (2011) point out, food "movements" are political, inspiring deeper change than simply one person's daily diet. From the organic food movement to permaculture, veganism, and raw food culture, food "movements" that go even beyond those discussed by Gimenez & Shattuck (2011) or Supersize Me raise...
Supersize Me focuses on only a small fragment of global food movements: the fundamental need to raise awareness and encourage media literacy about fast food.
Gimenez & Shattuck (2011) describe several related but distinct trends in food movements worldwide. One is the radical food movement, which "seeks deep, structural changes to food and
agriculture," (Gimenez & Shattuck, 2011, p. 128). The radical movement has gained some traction in developing nations and its discourse centers on issues related to entitlement and rights over food sovereignty. The progressive trend has evolved primarily in Northern and Western countries and focuses on "food justice" issues. The food reformist movement works within existing capitalist structures to show that
food security can provide "less socially and environmentally damaging alternatives into existing market structures," (Gimenez & Shattuck, 2011, p. 121). Because Spurlock (2004) recognizes the firm entrenchment of capitalist values, institutions, and structures in
American society, the film Supersize Me most closely fits into the reformist model.
Spurlock (2004) targets McDonalds specifically, and…
