** 1/2 STAR RATING (out of 4) | Documentary
PG-13. 1 hour 30 minutes. At the Mayan.
It’s tough for a documentary to make its case when it’s part of the problem it criticizes.
Like Morgan Spurlock’s other films, including “Super Size Me,” “The Greatest Movie Ever Sold” makes him the face of a first-person investigation. Here, he’s looking at the extent to which we are marketed to during every moment we’re awake.
The joke that blunts the impact of the movie is that Spurlock’s film is jam-packed with product placement and endorsements (its full title is “Pom Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold”). In fact, most of the movie shows Spurlock hustling for sponsors and advertisers while sharing pomegranate juice with such pundits as Ralph Nader and Noam Chomsky.
I think that Spurlock is an engaging performer, and I could see him as host of a talk show or a program like his late, lamented TV project, “30 Days.” But I don’t think he’s especially gifted as a filmmaker.
His argument isn’t particularly trenchant. Nothing in “Sold” will be new to anyone who has any interest in marketing or who has ever spent a minute on a busy street.
I do think Spurlock’s trip to Sao Paolo, where outdoor advertising has been banned, is enlightening, and there wasn’t a moment in the film when I wasn’t involved or even amused by what I saw. But afterward, I was left with a big pile of “So what?”
