‘The deck is just stacked against being healthy,” one public health official understates in this provocative, Katie Couric-narrated documentary about the nation’s childhood obesity epidemic.
In a move sure to infuriate “nanny state” critics, director Stephanie Soechtig names the US government and food corporations responsible for a campaign to get Americans addicted to junk food — particularly, and most dangerously, sugar — as early as possible.
Toggling between profiles of kids struggling with their weight and a wider look at the evolution of processed foods, “Fed Up” presents a pretty watertight case that there’s something deeply wrong with the way we eat. President Clinton, himself a reformed fast-foodie, weighs in, seeming to (vaguely) regret not doing more on this topic.
The film’s illustration of how “fat free” became our go-to, despite the ever-increasing toxicity of those products, should hit home for anyone who’s ever thought reaching for the nonfat Doritos was a good first step toward weight loss.