Steroids add muscle to this first-timer's documentary

First-time director Christopher Bell tossed three baseballs into the audience at a morning screening of his witty and well-researched steroid documentary "Bigger, Faster, Stronger."

"I just want to introduce my film by throwing out the first pitch," Bell said Wednesday, aiming the balls high into the packed theater.

Bell's film details steroid use in his own family -- he and his two brothers were once competitive power lifters and idolized Arnold Schwarzenegger and Hulk Hogan -- and analyzes America's love-hate relationship with the drug.

He said both his brothers continue to use steroids. One had had a short stint in the World Wrestling Federation. His other brother is a champion power lifter, seen in the film bench-pressing 705 pounds.

Bell himself is seen working at Gold's Gym at Venice Beach. "I really thought muscles were going to be the answer," Bell says in the film. "But all it got me was a job selling gym memberships."

He goes deep into the subject, which he and his team spent three years researching. Among those interviewed: disgraced Olympic sprinter Ben Johnson, Spider-Man co-creator Stan Lee, disgraced Tour de France cyclist Floyd Landis and Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Beverly Hills).

Memorable scenes:

-- A clip of a pre-"Good Will Hunting" Ben Affleck in what appears to be an '80s-era after-school TV special doing his best impression of "roid rage."

-- Waxman, who orchestrated the 2005 hearings starring baseball players Mark McGwire and Jose Conseco, blanking on whether steroid use is legal (along with the whereabouts of the $2 million Congress set aside to educate kids on the evils of the drug after those hearings).

-- And finally, a glimpe of the "he-man" of the bovine family -- the Belgian Blue Bull that is genetically predisposed to grow what Bell termed "double muscle" and can weigh in at about 2,600 pounds.

-- Gina Piccalo