Initial Research: Morgan Spurlock

 

Considering my final project this term will be a short film, I am going to do initial research on production techniques. That's why I decided to take a closer look at the film 'Super Size Me' created by Morgan Spurlock. 

The documentary presents the effect of an experiment that Spurlock conducted on himself. 'The filmmaker was a healthy 32-year-old when he embarked on the challenge on 1 February 2003, but over the course of the next 30 days he deteriorated rapidly, as he consumed 5,000 calories a day - twice as many as recommended as part of a balanced diet.'(Massey, 2023).

Super Size Me By Morgan Spurlock

The author demonstrated exceptional professionalism and a competent journalistic technique while creating the document. 'In between meals, Spurlock drives across the country and interviews a host of health and nutrition experts, lawyers, school workers, and a surprisingly trim man who has eaten over 19,000 Big Macs yet maintains a healthy cholesterol level.'(watchdocumentaries.com, 2004). Spurlock uses three rhetorical appeals (logos, ethos, and pathos) to persuade his audience to agree with his main point. 'In the documentary Supersize Me, Spurlock uses pathos to appeal to the audience's emotions. One example is when Spurlock was vomiting right after eating "Supersized" fries and drinking (coke) right outside his car. Another example is when Spurlock called his mom to tell her that his liver is being destroyed by the McDonald's food.'(Anthony, 2014)

Moreover, he used logos to authenticate his theses. 'Logos was very key in this documentary to persuade the audience by giving factual, scientific detail. Through logos the results were seen in numbers and able to be put down in the form of data and statistics.'(Harding, 2014)

 In the book 'Don't Eat This Book: Fast Food and the Supersizing of America' , from 2005, Spurlock goes much further; he undertakes an unequal fight against food production giants and fast food chains and exposes the marketing mechanisms of the largest corporations. It opposes the common manipulation used by manufacturers, trying to make consumers aware of the risks of consuming widely available and constantly advertised snacks, sweets, carbonated drinks and fast food.

DON'T EAT THIS BOOK By Morgan Spurlock

In my film, I am going to use one of the rhetorical appeals - pathos - in order to influence the audience. Furthermore, I will show interviews with DMU students, who are my 'experts' on culture shock. I hope that in this way I will be able to establish contact with the audience and get them interested in my movie.

References

Massey, J. (2023). Guy who ate McDonald’s three meals a day for a month suffered horrific consequences. [online] LADbible. Available at: https://www.ladbible.com/community/mcdonalds-three-meals-super-size-me-080560-20230127/ [Accessed 26 Oct. 2023].

watchdocumentaries.com. (2004). Super Size Me (2004) | WatchDocumentaries.com. [online] Available at: https://watchdocumentaries.com/super-size-me/ [Accessed 26 Oct. 2023].

Anthony, H. (2014). Pathos. [online] supersize me. Available at: https://supersizedargument.weebly.com/pathos.html [Accessed 29 Oct. 2023].

Harding, A. (2014). Logos. [online] supersize me. Available at: https://supersizedargument.weebly.com/logos.html [Accessed 29 Oct. 2023].