Supersize Me uses a participatory documentary style, with the director Morgan Spurlock directly participating by only eating fast food for 30 days. This allows him to experience the health effects firsthand and draw conclusions about how fast food is affecting modern American society. Throughout the documentary, Spurlock represents Americans in a negative light by implying they are to blame for obesity through choices like exposing children to junk food marketing and adults' choices to consume unhealthy fast food. However, scenes with his vegan girlfriend contradict this stereotype by showing not all Americans are unhealthy.

1. what are the main codes and convention of
the documentary genre used in supersize
me? how is modern American society
represented in the documentary

2. Introduction
• Supersize me is an American documentary investigating how the fats
food industry is slowly killing America. The director Morgan Spurlock
explores how eating only fast food for 30 days can harm your body. The
camera follows spurlock in his day to day life and captures the dramatic
changes to his body and health. At the end of the documentary spurlock
discovered that he severely damaged his liver. Overall I do believe that
the documentary represents the American public in a bad light. As
Spurlock is directly involved in the documentary, he has full control over
the way he narrates, which could make the audience develop a certain
view of the American public. Therefore I believe that Spurlock
encouraged the audience to perceive a negative view of the American
public due to the way he narrated the documentary.

3. Modes
Supersize me consists of different types of modes such
as: performative, expository, participatory and reflexive.
The documentary was mostly participatory as the
director (Morgan Spurlock) was directly involved in the
making of the documentary. Spurlock participating in the
documentary allowed him to experience the effect fast-
food has on a human being and to investigate if
Americans were really to blame for the growing
percentage of obesity in the country. It allowed him
develop an opinion of the situation and challenge the
American public. Combining all these modes was
effective as it allowed Spurlock to interact with the
audience more.

4. Music
The music side of the documentary is split in to diegetic and non diegetic sound. At
the beginning of the documentary non diegetic music is played called “fat bottomed
girls” by queen. The song is humorous which makes the audience feel that the subject
is something they can take lightly and laugh about, which then turns the subject into a
joke. The music used here is effective is it diverts you from the negative and serious
connotations related to obesity and portrays it as being entertaining rather than being
serious and clinical. Additionally diegetic music is used at the beginning of the
documentary when the children are reciting the words to the McDonalds theme song,
instead of singing more educational or doing something more productive e.g sports.
This scene is effective as it demonstrates how vulnerable young people are to
unhealthy diets. Spurlock would be viewed as being very bias in this scene as it would
seem as if he is blaming the parents and adults for exposing negative things to our
children. This scene demonstrates how spurlock blames the American public for
obesity, as he is trying to show us that whatever we expose our selves to more will
make us more addicted to it. Therefore as we are exposing our children to unhealthy
diets they are becoming more addicted and used to the lifestyle. Furthermore this
scene is represented as being bias, as it is representing the American public in a
completely bad light.

5. Graphics
Moreover there were changing graphics of two teenage girls
gradually getting bigger. The graphics showed the public how
unhealthy and obese they were these graphics were effective
as they enhanced the big question. (Is fast food harming
America?) This would have shocked the audience as they
would have been extremely surprised that teenagers would
be able to put on weight to that extent, and therefore
persuade them to believe that fast food is destroying
America. Also Spurlocks message here might be implying that
a fast-food restaurant cannot make you put on so much
weight that it makes you obese, therefore it most be your
fault. We can then see that Spurlock could be biased at this
stage and blaming obesity on the American public instead of
putting blame on fast food companies

6. Last supper
• Spurlocks last supper of eating whatever he wants allowed the audience
to relate to him on a more personal level. His vegan girlfriend gives us an
opinion about what she thought about Spurlocks 30 day unhealthy diet.
She diverts from the “typical” American presented in this documentary as
she is a vegan chef who eats mostly organic food. There was no music
throughput this scene, as the director wanted us to focus on what was
being said. The food presented in this scene was organic which goes
against the stereotype pf Americans being unhealthy. This scene is
therefore effective as it contradicts the negative perspective many people
have about Americans. Spurlocks shows us that not all Americans are
unhealthy. You could also argue that Spurlocks still believes that it is the
Americans fault as to why they are obese. This is because he might be
trying to imply that we have a choice on the type of food we decide to put
into our body. We can decide to eat healthy (like he and his girlfriend are
doing) or we can eat consume our bodies with unhealthy food that would
result in us gaining weight. Therefore if we become overweight we have
nobody but ourselves to blame, because we freely decided to consume
our bodies with junk food.

7. Last supper
• Spurlocks last supper of eating whatever he wants allowed the audience
to relate to him on a more personal level. His vegan girlfriend gives us an
opinion about what she thought about Spurlocks 30 day unhealthy diet.
She diverts from the “typical” American presented in this documentary as
she is a vegan chef who eats mostly organic food. There was no music
throughput this scene, as the director wanted us to focus on what was
being said. The food presented in this scene was organic which goes
against the stereotype pf Americans being unhealthy. This scene is
therefore effective as it contradicts the negative perspective many people
have about Americans. Spurlocks shows us that not all Americans are
unhealthy. You could also argue that Spurlocks still believes that it is the
Americans fault as to why they are obese. This is because he might be
trying to imply that we have a choice on the type of food we decide to put
into our body. We can decide to eat healthy (like he and his girlfriend are
doing) or we can eat consume our bodies with unhealthy food that would
result in us gaining weight. Therefore if we become overweight we have
nobody but ourselves to blame, because we freely decided to consume
our bodies with junk food.