In his previous film, Super Size Me, Morgan Spurlock was the little guy who took on the Big Mac. Now he’s back with a new mission impossible: to find the most wanted man on the planet, Osama Bin Laden. I don’t think anyone can accuse me of giving the plot away if I reveal that we don’t actually find Bin Laden - but we do discover a very different, and less appealing, Spurlock than the one we saw before.

In Super Size Me, Spurlock was an endearing human guinea pig; here, he is a rat. His film is founded on a fake premise. Morgan and his wife, Alexandra, are soon to have a baby, so, like a good parent, dad worries about the kind of world he’s bringing his baby into. He wants to do something to make the world a safer place, so he sets out to deal with the threat of terrorism by finding Bin Laden. But we know, and he knows, that there’s no way he’s going to find Bin Laden. And even if he did, as the film eventually concedes, it wouldn’t make that much difference, because Al-Qaeda would still be in business. So why pretend this is your motive for the film? Spurlock sells himself as the ordinary guy who is caring and, most important of all, honest. He shows us what a good guy he is by cutting back to scenes featuring him talking on the phone to his pregnant wife: listening to her worries about his safety and fears that he won’t be back in time for the birth. Yet if, as he claims, he really cares so much for mother and child, he would be right by their side. The reason he’s not there is not terrorism but careerism: he wants to go off and make his movie. Spurlock acts the part of the big-hearted innocent brilliantly, but don’t be fooled. You could say he’s as shrewd and cynical as any politician prepared to exploit his family for popularity.

The film begins with a frantic attempt to prove to the audience that this isn’t going to be a boring documentary about terrorism. No, Spurlock is going to present the funny, entertaining side of terror-ism! Thus, we begin with a video-game-like battle between Bin Laden and a ninja-like Spurlock. This allows him to send up the idea of the war on terrorism as avideo-game, but to use the violence of thegenre to entertain the younger members of the audience.

The film soon settles down, and we watch Spurlock as he travels across Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Israel. His mission begins to shift its purpose as he starts to explore the mindset and political factors that provide fertile grounds for terrorism. Consequently, it becomes rather a flat and dull series of interviews with journalists, American soldiers, ordinary Afghans and Saudi schoolchildren.

You get the feeling that, every so often, Spurlock suddenly worries about being dull and worthy, so he tries to jazz up the proceedings by injecting more dramatic foot-age – as when he goes on a bomb-patrol mission with Israelis or is harassed by orthodox Jews – even if these scenes tell us nothing about the subject.

What he discovers is pretty standard stuff, and some of it dubious. Poverty, he claims, breeds the conditions that favour terrorism – despite the fact that the very terrorist he is looking for is filthy rich. And who doesn’t share his belief that we should build more schools in Afghani-stan? What he fails to mention is that the Taliban kill teachers who try to educate women.

This kind of personality-driven documentary depends not so much on the persuasiveness of the polemic as on the appeal of the person on camera. A little bit of Spurlock goes a long way. He has a nice, easy-going manner and is able to bridge the great cultural gap between him and ordinary people with just a chuckle, but he is not a funny guy in the sense that his comments make you laugh. Much of the humour feels fake and forced, as when he wanders the city streets of the Middle East with a map in hand and goes up to members of the public, including veiled women, to ask: “Can you tell me where Osama Bin Laden is?” It’s an idiotic thing to do.

By the end, you feel you haven’t really learnt anything new. Spurlock’s big insight is that the majority of Muslims want to work, provide for their families and give their children the best start in life, just like you and me. I think he would have done better to give his family the best start by staying at home instead of making this film.

12A, 90 mins

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