textSize : default : medium : large    A little controversy can go a long way and filmmaker Morgan Spurlock serves it up with relish in his documentary, 'Super Size Me'. The concept of the film is simple, and merely chronicles what happened when you took a healthy man and fed him super sized McDonald's food for 30 days. The man in question was the film's director, Spurlock, who had pre and post medicals to accurately document the impact of a month's worth of McDonalds. Like Michael Moore, Spurlock likes to push reality to extremes to make his point and prior to making this movie honed his film-shock skills on MTV's 'I Bet You Will'. But 'Super Size Me' works well and won Spurlock the Best Director Award at the Sundance Film Festival this year, and was one of the hottest tickets at the festival. The fast food industry and McDonalds itself has grown so bloated that straight factual information seems unbelievable. In 1972 we spent 3 billion on fast food -- today we spend 110 billion. In the U.S. people eat more than a million animals an hour. Almost 2/3's of all Americans are either overweight or obese. The average child sees 10,000 TV ads per year, many of them for fast food. Before most children can speak they can recognize McDonalds. McDonalds distributes more toys per year that Toys-R-Us. 40% of American meals are eaten outside the home. Morgan Spurlock, against his doctor's advice, ate exclusively at McDonalds for a month and accepted any and every offer to super size his meals. In 30 days his weight ballooned 25 lbs., his total cholesterol rose and there were measurable negative changes in liver function. He seemed like a man taking a short cut to diabetes. In the movie, people are able to watch Spurlock pack on the weight and ride out some wild mood swings interspersed with segments about obesity and processed food in North America. There have been no McLibel suits from McDonalds but on March 1, 2004 McDonalds announced that it is officially "phasing out" their Super Size options for fries and drinks. Not content with downsizing some portions, McDonalds are planning the national launch of the "Go Active" (Adult Happy Meal) which includes a salad, bottle of water, a pedometer!!!!! and a diet and activity log designed by Oprah's nutrition guru Bob Greene. As part of our market research we asked a young McDonalds-using friend to request supersizing his fries. No problem. I guess the head office edict hasn't made it to the West Coast of Canada. Maybe Morgan Spurlock touched a nerve.. 'Super Size Me' is scheduled for a May release in theatres and has been picked up by A&E for showing towards the end of 2004. The purveyor's of fast food are safe from lawyers for a while. In what some are calling the McDonald's amendment, the House of Representatives voted to bar customers from suing fast food franchises on the grounds that burgers, fried chicken and fries are making them obese and sick.

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