Director: Natalie Erika James
Writers: Natalie Erika James
Stars: Midori Francis, Madaleine Madden, Danielle Macdonald
Synopsis: Hana, a lovelorn medical student, becomes terrorized by a sinister force after taking part in an obscure weight loss craze: eating human ashes.
For as long as I have been conscious of myself, I have been insecure about my image. Being too fat, too tall, crooked teeth, you name it, I had an insecurity for it. Being a child of the 90s, I have seen just about every diet fad come and go, but the issue always remained: fatness still existed no matter what. Today is no different, with a new diet craze on the rise and the early 2000s thinness making a comeback; it’s hard not to feel pressured to partake in a culture that feeds off insecurities. So when a film like Saccharine comes along, it’s frustrating when it turns out to be hurtful rather than accepting.
Films involving beauty standards have seen an influx lately, with The Substance, Skincare, and The Ugly Stepsister all falling into the same category. As someone who watched all those films, I never felt completely seen because rarely do those films depict body types outside of acceptable levels of thinness. What piqued my interest in Saccharine was its examination of weight loss and diet culture. Anyone who has gone to the grocery store has seen that diet foods have gone overboard, with protein being baked into everything, even popcorn. Needless to say, the potential that Saccharine possesses in material is endless.
Writer and director Natalie Erika James opens her newest film with a montage of a fit woman working out with footage being interrupted with someone stuffing their face with various foods. Quickly, audiences are introduced to Hana (Midori Francis), a medical student working with a group on a cadaver. She’s a shy woman, and instantly her awkwardness is felt, especially when she is around a beautiful woman. A recent encounter with an old friend has captured her attention when a miracle weight loss supplement is introduced to her. But this isn’t a normal supplement; it’s made from human remains.
James goes to great lengths to show the extremes that deeply insecure people will go to just to become what society decides is an acceptable size. As Hana takes her first dose, the side effects, at least in the beginning, are worth it. She can eat whatever she wants, and it doesn’t impact her appearance. It even gives her the confidence to take a 12-week fitness course by Alanya (Madeleine Madden), a fit gym employee at the gym she frequents. As the pounds fell off, the insecurity remained, with James choosing to have a fat woman haunt Hana that only she can see. Understandably, this makes her increasingly unhinged around those around her to escape this woman
Saccharine is a film filled with potential, but it squanders a lot of what it has going for it by its own harsh view of fatness. Francis is a great lead and gives a heartfelt performance, but this film feels like it was made for a plus-size actress to shine. As an example, the film has Hana wear what appears to be a prosthetic double chin in the beginning to evoke some kind of overweight look, with baggy clothes. This is truly a shame because these cultures don’t just target larger bodies, they target all age groups and sizes. One can’t help but wonder why they couldn’t leave the actress as is, instead of adding a double chin as if it’s a flaw needing to be removed?
Hana has a complicated view of food and bigness, coming from a family where her mother is incredibly small, and her father is overweight, suffering from many health issues. She loves sweets and carbs, but also fears becoming the size that her father is. Her family life isn’t established in a particularly meaningful way; even when James shows her around them, their issues with one another remain largely ambiguous. It comes across that this portion of the film is meant to explain why Hana feels the way she does about herself, but it doesn’t move the story forward much at all.
The horror aspects of Saccharine are mainly during Hana sneaking into her lab to remove various portions of her cadaver’s body to make more of her pills or jump scares when an unclothed being appears in the reflection of Hana’s spoon. James does well with these, making up for the lack of coherent ideas with a great sense of tension. Seeing Hana emotionally eat through the stress of being attacked by someone, she can only see and highlight some of the more disturbing moments of the film.
The film clocks in at nearly 2 hours and definitely has its repetitive moments. A majority of the film is Hana working out and trying to out-eat this hungry ghost hanging around her. And it’s hard to keep track of what moments happened in this stretch of runtime. With constant back and forth between her apartment, the lab, and the gym, it all gets muddled together. Throw on top of that, James focusing more on the being that has attached itself to Hana rather than making an impactful commentary on the predator habits of dieting fads, Saccharine overstays its welcome by the final act.
At the end of it all, Saccharine is well made, with disturbing visuals, and uncomfortable food noises galore. It can be enjoyed for those aspects alone, even when the rest falls short. Coloring is a major aspect of Saccharine, and the use of close-up shots brings us directly into Hana’s view. Even the gym that Hana attends is viewed through a bright and colorful lens as opposed to the gloom of the rest of her life. When we watch her binge on all the food she can find, it doesn’t look appetizing; it looks painful as she chews and chews. Anyone with an ASMR queasiness should steer clear. While Saccharine is a let-down in many aspects, it shows James as a confident filmmaker tackling topics that need to be pushed to the forefront. It’s just an utter shame that it chooses to blame a woman for her insecurities rather than the companies that make money off of women all around the world.
