Movie theater popcorn gets two thumbs down from advocacy group

Eating popcorn at the movies used to be fun. Now it's scary, thanks to the Center for Science in the Public Interest -- the advocacy group that also has given the beat-down to Chinese food, fast food and most other things Americans love to pig out on.

The group performed lab tests on popcorn purchased from the largest movie chains, AMC and Regal, and came up with this equation: That eating a medium popcorn with a soda at a Regal theater is equal to eating three McDonald's Quarter Pounders with 12 pats of butter.

That's 1,610 calories and 60 grams of saturated fat. And, just to rub it in, CSPI noted the high profits the chain must collect for selling the combo for $12 -- given how cheap popcorn and soda actually are.