Supersize Me vs. Me and Mickey D 

Supersize Me, a documentary by Morgan Spurlock, undertakes the challenge himself of eating McDonald's for an entire month in hopes to shed light on the issue if obesity in America. During the experiment, Spurlock displayed many different side effects from his new diet including mood swings, weight gain, major changes to his blood pressure and sodium levels, the effects this had on others around him and many more. This supports Spurlock's message to the wider community of that he presents McDonald's to be extremely unhealthy and that it can be linked to obesity when eaten on an everyday basis. The validity of his experiment is proven by the interviews he has with random people on the streets in America about their average consumption and thoughts on Mcdonald's, research conducted on the average American diet which Spurlock follows and expert advice from medical professionals on the effects this is having on his body. To make the audience believe his message by not only conducting the experiment himself, but through the camera techniques of close-ups, mid shots and tracking shots; all these provide an 'in your face' insight into his eating habits. The only holes found though in his documentary that make you question his strategy is that Spurlock was checked before he started this and was concluded to be in perfect physical and mental shape, which would cause his body to react to this new diet in a more dramatic way. Plus, the average American diet includes eating fast food, which Spurlock must have done but not as regularly as others so again a more dramatic effect would occur. 

Me and Mickey D directed and starred by Soso Whaley, approaches Spurlock's diet at a new angle to prove that McDonald's is not your enemy. Whaley ate McDonald's for 30 days, similar to Spurlock, but was eating with a 200 calorie a day limit in hopes in lose 10 pounds in that time period. She had to still eat every item off the single item menu but Whaley's message was that you could still eat McDonald's on a day to day basis but do so by eating less and exercising more. She also states that millions of people eat McDOnald's everyday and don't suffer from health problems, contradicting Spurlock's message. The validity of her argument is proven by, again similar to Spurlock, her conducting the experiment herself and tracks this as she goes but she also includes video inserts of interviews and opinions from experts and other people on the matter. Linking to validity, as a viewer you believe her message because she shows her weight change every week when she steps on the scales revealing she losses 9 pounds over the month period, she shows herself ordering and eating the McDonald's food and finally it shows her exercising. The only holes found throughout this whole documentary is the fact that Whaley sets herself with a 200 calorie a day limit which therefore only proves McDonald's can be healthy IF you stick to this limit and exercise regularly. 

Both these documentaries present completely different views on the fast food chain of McDonald's where one shows it as being the enemy, whilst the other presents it as a weight loss tool. I could say that I am swayed towards the Supersize Me documentary because it has such raw footage of the effects of eating excessive amounts of McDonald's  but then I could say I am swayed by Me and Mickey D because it is proven that McDonald's can help you lose weight. Overall however, I would have to say that Supersize Me takes the hat for the only reason being that I could not see myself conducting a similar experiment to Whaley in that I would chose to lose weight in a different way but seeing how it can actually happen very much surprised me.