Words You Can Use: The BAVC BLOG

By Mindy Aronoff, Director of Training & Resources

Does meeting director Morgan Spurlock in person help one like the movie more? Hell yes. Well, let’s put it this way: about 13 minutes into the screening at SXSW in Austin where Mr. Spurlock was in attendance, a spring thunderstorm knocked all the power out. When the lights came back on, the projectionist was having a hell of a time re-booting the digital projector, so Mr. Spurlock–oh, let’s call him Morgan, shall we?–shouted out, “drinks for everyone on me!” Sure enough, 10 uniformed ushers began passing out cold cans of Tecate to the entire theatre (thank you, Texas liquor laws).

If you saw SUPERSIZE ME, you know Spurlock has the same kind of fun Michael Moore does (but he’s a lot cuter). In this doc, which premiered at Sundance in January, he shleps us through Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Jerusalem and other colorful Middle Eastern sites, shoving the mic in people’s faces and querying them about bin Laden’s whereabouts like he’s asking if the food is good at Moti’s Falafel Stand.

Is the movie a joke? Not really, although I did laugh a lot. True to character, Spurlock comes across as the guy next door, an everyman who tells it like we would if we had the cajones. We see him, pre-trip, going through a rigorous faux-FBI training program aimed at teaching rookies when to duck and how to avoid being blown up into shwarma bits. It really is silly at times—outside of a Tora Bora cave he sings out “yoo hoo! Osama bin LAH-den…!” Ridiculous. But isn’t that kinda what you would want to do?

Good Neighbor Morg tries to cajole everyone he meets but we find that not everyone loves our Ugly American. Agitated orthodox Jewish men angrily evict him from their hood. He’s given the boot at an Islamic high school. And he looks pretty darn stoopid infiltrating an Imam, where the main guy is giving instructions on how to destroy America. Oh, sure, we meet mothers and grandfathers and teens who proclaim to hate only the government–not us, of course, not the regular folks. [insert eye rolling here]

I knew some of bin Laden’s background from reading The Looming Tower, an excellent read, btw, so I got extremely nervous at one point in the movie when Spurlock and crew get very, very close to finding The World’s Most Dangerous Man. You can’t help but wonder what will happen when they come face to face. Supah SCAH-wee. I give the man props for traveling that far and then re-examining his naïve premise. Yet, when the lights came back on, we all followed Spurlock outside the theatre, drinking our Tecates in the humid parking lot, and it was easy to suspend disbelief and blissfully think that we can all get along. Now where is the world did we get that idea?