The frying game

In makeover-obsessed America, Morgan Spurlock's on-screen transformation went in the wrong direction: from fit to flabby in a mere 30 days, aided by a little company called McDonald's.

But when the filmmaker steps out of a car on Tremont Street and strides once again under those golden arches -- this time for an interview, not a McGriddle -- any doubts about his health are put to rest. With his handlebar mustache intact, he looks as trim as in the early scenes of "Super Size Me," his comedic documentary about fast food and obesity that opens Friday.

"I feel great," he says, declining to order anything and sipping from a bottle of water. Everything back to normal? "Everything. Including my sex life."

Spurlock wasn't feeling so hot by the time he wrapped "Super Size Me," his first feature, which won the best documentary director award at the Sundance Film Festival. The all-McDonald's diet he put himself through took his 6-foot-2 frame from a sleek 185 to a paunchy 210 pounds. His cholesterol spiked, his liver functions were showing the same signs of damage as an alcoholic's, and his vegan-chef girlfriend was complaining about an impact on their love life. Most dramatically, a bout of chest pain and breathing difficulty had all three of his doctors advising that, with nine days to go, film or no film, he should stop.

He didn't, and the result is what "Roger and Me" might have been if Michael Moore had filmed himself getting a job at General Motors and then getting laid off a month later. Using a soundtrack that includes Queen's "Fat Bottomed Girl," Spurlock threads his admittedly extreme McBinge through a story of personal and corporate responsibility that sometimes tries for shock value, sometimes gets a bit heavy-handed, and almost always goes for laughs.

He shows pictures of George Washington, Jesus, the girl from Wendy's, and Ronald McDonald to children; guess which is the only one all can identify without hesitation? He films a woman outside the White House who has trouble reciting "The Pledge of Allegiance" but can rattle off "Two all-beef patties . . ." without misplacing a sesame seed. He sets a gastric-bypass stomach-reduction surgery to "Blue Danube." He visits a school cafeteria where a teenage

girl orders milk and fries for lunch ("my calcium and my vegetable," she says). And he demonstrates that pretty much nobody but a nutritionist can tell you what a calorie actually is. None of this would carry the same weight, so to speak, without Spurlock's own on-screen descent. "My film is a snapshot of your all-American life," the filmmaker says. "If you keep overeating and underexercising, over the course of your entire lifetime you could develop problems like I did."

The former stand-up comedian, playwright, and host of the MTV gag show "I Bet You Will" had the idea for the movie on Thanksgiving 2002. Stuffed with turkey, sitting on his couch at his childhood home in West Virginia, he saw a TV report about two teenage girls suing McDonald's for having caused their obesity. He called his friend Scott Ambrozy, the film's director of photography, and they went into preproduction immediately, calling experts, scheduling travel, and setting up interviews. Within two months they had started filming, and within a year -- 250 hours of video, 25,000 miles, $65,000, and 25 pounds later -- they had a movie.

Filming inside McDonald's, with a few exceptions, was no problem, especially since they used such a small camera. "People asked, `What are you doing?' We'd say, `Making a movie.' They'd say, `Oh, that's cool. You want fries with that?' "

The rules for his super-sizing mission were drawn from a judge's statement that if the plaintiffs "can allege that McDonald's products' intended use is to be eaten for every meal of every day" and that doing so would be "unreasonably dangerous," they may have a claim.

Spurlock then vowed that for 30 days he would eat only at McDonald's, and only what was available over the counter, with no options; he would super-size only when offered; he would eat every item on the menu at least once; and he would eat "three squares" a day: breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

As both filmmaker and subject, Spurlock includes some events -- including a vomiting scene on Day 2 -- that may strike some of the more cynical members of the audience as exaggerated, given that he had a stake in the outcome, but he defends all the scenes as true.

"What you see is what you get," Spurlock says. "When I was depressed I was depressed, and when I felt sick I felt terrible. I had no idea what was going to happen in the course of this film."

The numbers, meanwhile, tell the story too: Besides the weight gain, his total cholesterol rose by 65 points and his liver enzymes went so out of whack that one of his doctors compared his liver to pate and Spurlock to the suicidal character played by Nicolas Cage in "Leaving Las Vegas."

The fact that Spurlock doesn't walk away from the burgers, as his doctors urge him to on Day 21, gives the movie a performance-art feel. Wouldn't his point have still been made? The filmmaker says he decided to continue after calling his oldest brother, Craig, who still lives in West Virginia. "He said, `Morgan, people eat this [expletive] their whole life. Do you really think it's gonna kill you in nine more days?' "

McDonald's, which refused to grant Spurlock an on-screen interview with CEO Jim Cantalupo (who recently died of a heart attack), is understandably not happy about "Super Size Me." When it showed at Sundance, the corporation called it a "super-sized distortion of the quality, choice, and variety available at McDonald's." In a phone interview last week, Cathy Kapica, the company's director of global nutrition, called Spurlock's film "an irresponsible stunt."

Since Spurlock made the film, however, the company has announced plans to phase out the super-size option and began rolling out healthier menu items. They insist that none of this has anything to do with "Super Size Me." Walt Riker, vice president of corporate communications, said the decision to phase out super-sizing was made two years ago, and the instructions to restaurants nationwide were printed in a booklet last year.

To Spurlock, the timing of McDonald's efforts could hardly be better, keeping the issue in the news as his movie debuts to a wider audience. And he can't help but take some credit for the changes.

"Last week, they announced the `GoActive! Happy Meal' with the salad and the pedometer. When are they launching that nationwide? May 6. When does the movie open? May 7. Just another amazing coincidence."

McDonald's isn't the only critic of Spurlock's film; at least two fast-food devotees have gone public with response diets before they've even seen it. One of them hopes to make a movie of her own.

Soso Whaley of Kensington, N.H., motivated by the idea that "Super Size Me" is merely "junk science," is hoping to show she can lose 10 pounds by limiting her intake to about 1,800 calories a day, all from McDonald's -- a far cry from the 5,000 calories Spurlock took in every 24 hours. As her 30 days were coming to a close last week, she says she hit her goal, dropping from 175 to 165 pounds, and was waiting for blood-test results. And in San Antonio, Air Force sergeant Deshan Woods says he lost almost 9 pounds between mid-March and mid-April eating nothing but McDonald's food -- but drinking only diet soda.

All the attention, of course, delights Spurlock, whose production company, The Con, is at work on its next project, a series set to debut on FX in the fall. "30 Days" will tackle a social issue such as religion, poverty, or sexuality by taking people out of their normal lives and immersing them in someone else's for a month.

"Just how I reached breaking points at different places, this person will reach a breaking point," he says.

When that point comes, will "30 Days" let the subject have the option of stopping the experiment?

"We'll see," Spurlock says with a grin.

Joe Yonan can be reached at yonan@globe.com.