(1.5 Stars)
Now on Amazon Prime Video
People sure do enjoy talking about food. And when they’ve eaten too much food, they enjoy talking about the latest fad diet they are on.
But when I talk about my strategy for staying thin – skipping meals – people look at me with glassy eyes. It’s like that’s an alien topic that I am not supposed to mention. People look at me like it is a superhuman accomplishment. Or they say: “that’s not healthy.”
Well, I do not claim to know the secret to eternal health. But I actually do know the secret to eternal skinniness. For me, it is to eat as much as I can stomach from the time I get up until noon. Then nothing the rest of the day and night. Easy enough.
To be fair, I am open to eating dinner once a week or so with my wife when we go out on a date.
What I am not open to is eating three meals day, separated by approximately four hours, with dinner as the largest and most important meal. Not a chance. I do not understand the popularity of that lifestyle. It’s like you are eating or thinking of eating or preparing meals all the time. And, worst of all, you are eating the most when you need the least fuel.
The people who made “Fasting” actually agree with me! For that, I am grateful. “Fasting” is not a good documentary. It is over-long, repetitive, and preachy. But in my fight for fewer meals, I’ll take any allies I can find.
The movie argues that eating several times throughout the day is likely to make you fat and unhealthy. Your body’s natural circadian rhythm is to have approximately 12 hours each day with no food so it can focus on healing rather than digestion.
Apparently, there was a study where two groups of mice were fed the exact same amount of food each day. One group that had access to food all the time. The second group was restricted to eating only half the day. Group one gained weight and group two remained thin.
The movie goes from convincing to kooky when it starts claiming that fasting is the key to a robust and healthy life. One guy claims that intermittent fasting normalized his irregular heartbeat and allowed him to complete the Iron Man Triathlon.
The movie claims that fasting can cure hypertension, heart disease, diabetes, chronic headaches, and even lymphoma.
I enjoy food documentaries, but I don’t know why they feel the need to make idiotic health claims that only their most ignorant, gullible viewers will believe.
Why can’t they just stick to the one promise that they can back up: fasting helps you get thin and stay thin. That’s enough.
Thinness is the greatest gift I have ever given myself and skipping dinner is a ridiculously small price to pay. In fact, it’s not a price at all; I have more time and more money because I don’t waste it on a meal I don’t need.
The only question is why skipping meals is significantly less popular than the myriad fad diet plans that don’t work….Check that…there is no question at all. It’s because fasting doesn’t make any companies any money.