Ahoy, squirts. Quint here with our good friend from Chi-town, Capone, and his take on two upcoming flicks: SUPERSIZE ME and RAISING HELEN. I may be the only person in the world who didn't think too much of Morgan Spurlock's documentary. I may be defensive because I'm fat, but the only part of the documentary that I could take seriously are the side trips covering subjects like school lunch programs. As for the main thrust of the documentary... you take a guy who exercizes regularly, doesn't often eat junk food... then he stops exercizing and lives off of McDonalds 3 times a day for 30 days? Of course he's gonna fuck himself up! Anyway, Capone liked it better than I did, so read on below for the other side of the coin and a vicious little hit on Garry Marshall's newest.
Hey, everyone. Capone in Chicago here with reviews of two films that are bound to make my Top 10 of 2004 list. One will probably be on the 10 Best list; the other, the 10 Worst list. And I'll give you three guesses which is which.
SUPER SIZE ME
While lying in a food-induced coma after a hefty Thanksgiving meal a couple years ago, Morgan Spurlock saw a news report that Americans, as a people, were fat beyond belief. Adults, yes, but more disturbingly children were eating unhealthy food in record numbers. Much of this food was coming from the overwhelming number of fast-food restaurants popping up all over the world. And kids in particular were being targeted as eaters at these restaurants through commercials shown during Saturday morning cartoons and the playground that some chains have added to their locations. The news reports focused on a couple of young girls whose families were suing McDonalds for targeting children and that they were causing Americans to actually get sick with heart disease, diabetes, and any number of gastrointestinal problems. None of this is exactly news today, but Spurlock was inspired to experiment using claims my McDonalds and other chains that some intake fast food has nutritional value. The problem is many Americans eat a steady diet of fast food. So Spurlock launches a 30-day, doctor-monitored, McDonalds-only diet (three meals per day, eating nothing but items off McDonalds' menu). And if the person behind the counter asks him if he'd like to Super Size his meal, he must accept. Even in such a short timeframe, the effects on his body are devastating.
The temptation when reviewing this film is to simply regurgitate the many facts that Spurlock dishes out (all puns intended), but I'll try to refrain. (Or you can just read the interview with him on AICN.) He does a great job of doing that himself with the help of some humorous animation and not-so-humorous cold hard evidence. Spurlock doesn't just go after McDonalds, but since they're the biggest target (and the chain with the most capacity for change), his experiment centers on them. He also examines the appalling state of school lunch programs and even features one school in Wisconsin that has one of the healthiest alternatives to pizza and tater tots around...at no additional cost to the school or students. Spurlock cites studies not only about the physical complications of an unhealthy diet and no exercise, but the mental side effects. He analyzes marketing spending and practices of the largest chains versus campaign to get kids to eat healthy. Perhaps the scariest part of the film is his look at the food industry lobbying groups who effectively keep legislation from being passed that would force fast food chains to curb their output of unhealthy products.
But the film never feels like a lecture. Spurlock's humor quotient is high, and many of the jokes are at his expense. We get to know a spirited group of supporting players in his life, including his vegan-chef girlfriend and a team of doctors who examine him every few days and marvel at the rapid downturn his previously healthy body takes. For those of you who have read "Fast Food Nation," much of the data in SUPER SIZE ME may not be new, but by putting an amusing human face on the second greatest killer of Americans after smoking instantly makes you take stock in your own eating practices.
And unlike the politically charged films of Michael Moore, Spurlock's account in nonpartisan (although he does take a few pot shots and George W., but you have to, right?), or maybe "bipartisan" is a better word, since both parties are to blame. SUPER SIZE ME is not just a film that makes you think; it's the kind of film that will change behavior on a personal and national level. Hell, it already has. Shortly after it's premiere at the Sundance Film Festival this past January, McDonalds announced it would no longer sell Super Size meals. The corporation says the film in no way impacted this decision. Bullshit! This is the only documentary you NEED to see this year. The film opens in many major cities (including Chicago at the Landmark Century Center Theatres) this Friday.
RAISING HELEN
Fluffy as cotton balls, sappy as syrup, and predictable as, well, every other Garry Marshall-directed film ever (including RUNAWAY BRIDE, BEACHES, PRETTY WOMAN), RAISING HELEN serves primarily as a showcase for its highly lovable star Kate Hudson. Beyond that, there's not much here to recommend.
Hudson plays the titular Helen, a swinging single working at a modeling agency in Manhattan. She excels at anticipating the needs of the agency's talent, the clients, and her boss Dominique (Helen Mirren, who makes the absolute most of about four minutes of screen time; in fact, the film has a bad habit of underusing its most talented cast members.), and her path to a full-fledged agent seems all but assured. But then tragedy strikes when one of Helen's two older sisters (Felicity Huffman) and her husband die suddenly, leaving behind three children. Rather than appointing guardianship to the far more motherly third sister (Joan Cusack, always a good choice), the dead sister gives them to Helen, throwing a serious wrench in her party life, social calendar, and work availability. I must jump in here to tell you how sick I've become of Garry Marshall directed "technique." There's only one sequence in the film where the three sisters and their families are all together. Rather than allowing the characters to talk and relate to each other in a way that we can get to know and care about them so that Huffman's death actually makes us sad, Marshall instead has the lot of them put in Devo's "Whip It" and dance around the living room. It's an emotional short cut from a filmmaker that rarely takes the time to develop the character's in his film (NOTHING IN COMMON and FRANKIE AND JOHNNY might be considered the exceptions to this). When the one sister dies, I felt nothing except sorry for myself for having endure Marshall's laziness.
Helen accepts the role of mother, but soon looses her job because she can no longer travel at a moment's notice or work late to oversee parties and fashion shows. She takes her time off to enroll the kids in the form of a Lutheran school led by the way-too-handsome Pastor Dan (John Corbett of MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING and "Sex and the City"), who immediately starts hitting on her. Helen gets a job as a receptionist for a nearby used car lot owned by the equally handsome Marshall staple Hector Elizondo. The movie jumps around a lot from being a slapstick comedy to something that vaguely resembles a family drama, as the oldest daughter (Hayden Panettier) gets mixed up with a wannabe hip-hop DJ from high school named BZ (don't ask me why I remember his name). When Paris Hilton shows up for a couple cameos in this movie, I knew I was in trouble.
RAISING HELEN is lame and brings nothing to the scary genre of films involving adults growing up thanks to kids. We get the obligatory "You're not my mother!" screaming match about 50 times here. The entire subplot involving letters the dead sister left the other two sisters explaining her parenting decision is pointless. And the fact that the Devo song lyrics are used later in the film as a dramatic plot element pretty much sealed the deal for me that RAISING HELEN sucks donkey. Hudson is cute as a button and a few of her outfits are revealing, bordering on sexy, but that doesn't begin to make up for repeated jokes about Elizondo's toupee. Marshall is committing the worst sin possible in Hollywood: showing his age. If I have yet to disuade you from seeing this, the film opens the last week of May.
Stay health, y'all.
Capone
Capone is frightened of Hector Elizondo's toupee... please comfort him with a friendly email!
