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Common Sense Note
Parents need to know that this documentary, although rated for mature audiences, should be required viewing for girls who've ever had a brush with an eating disorder (or who have friends who have). That said, you must watch with your kids. There's too much anguish and illness here to let them make sense of it alone. Fourteen may seem young, but waiting for a child to be of legal age could be too late. The film is a gripping, no-holds-barred 102 minutes of brutally honest footage about anorexia and bulemia and the psychological and physical consequences of both. The women portrayed are filled with mental anguish, there's talk of suicide, shots of purging, stomach tubes, and honest and intimate discussions (some laced with profanity). CAUTION: Tips on how to binge, purge, and avoid eating are discussed in the movie. While some people might feel that these tips will teach girls (or boys) how to be bulemic or anorexic, the truth is that motivated kids will find them out anyway, and it's important for families to know the warning signs to break past any denial they may have about their children's illness.
Families can talk about the nature and toll of eating disorders. What starts them? What are the women feeling? Have your kids ever felt that way? Do they know people who have? Ask your kids if they know people who are already bingeing and purging or starving themselves. If they do, have they told anyone? If not, why? What role does shame play? Powerlessness? And how does the secret nature of the behavior affect the women in the movie? Can your kids make the connection between keeping secrets, covering for friends, and the nature of this hidden disease? Do your children understand the pressures to be thin in this society? Have they ever felt that they were too fat? What did they do about it? What about your own behavior? What are you modeling for your children? For more discussion points, go to the HBO site to download the Thin discussion guide.
Common Sense Review
Reviewed By: Liz Perle
THIN opens with a couple of gripping statistics: Eating disorders affect 5 million people in the United States, and more than 10 percent of those diagnosed with anorexia nervosa will die from the disease. Director Lauren Greenfield puts an honest, intimate face on this devastating disease in her gripping, masterful documentary. It's impossible to watch the women Greenfield documents and not be moved, educated, and sobered.
To make her movie (which will be made available to individuals, educators, and community groups), Greenfield went inside the Renfrew Center, a Florida treatment facility. Thin follows four women between the ages of 15 and 30 who are literally dying to be thin. In the course of telling their stories, the film teaches viewers about the psychology, pathology, and medical consequences of eating disorders.
Greenfield began documenting eating disorders in 1997, first for a Time magazine story and then for her book Girl Culture. To make Thin, she lived at the Renfrew Center for six months, gaining access to and earning the trust of both patients and staff. The result is an unparalleled portrayal of women caught in the grips of a compulsive disease for which they would be willing to die.
Thin focuses on four anorexic women. Brittany is a 15-year-old whose eating disorder began when she was 8. Shelly, 25, has a feeding tube put in her stomach when she enters Renfrew after several hospitalizations. Alisa, 30, a divorced mother of two, arrives at Renfrew following five hospital stays in three months. And Polly, 29, has spent years in and out of treatment and often challenges the center's policies and procedures.
Theirs is an agonizing story, beginning with 5 a.m. weigh-ins and moving on to struggles with meals, therapy sessions, and group encounters. As the women's lives unfold on camera, a mosaic forms of the compulsion, the denial, and the horrible psychological toll anorexia exacts. Although each woman's fight for recovery is unique, Greenfield paints a cumulative portrait of the disease's hallmarks -- shame, dishonesty, secrecy, and ambivalence about recovery. Some of the women sabotage their own treatment, while others make significant strides. Some will make progress, only to relapse. And still others find their recovery thwarted by insurance companies who won't cover the long-term care they require.
Unflinching and incisive, Thin is an emotional journey through the world of eating disorders that provides a greater understanding of their complexity, encompassing not just issues about food, body image, and self-esteem, but also a mix of personal, familial, cultural, and mental health concerns.
An HBO Documentary Films presentation, Thin won the best feature-length documentary award at the London Film Festival and competed in the 2006 Sundance Film Festival. The film was produced by (among others) R.J. Cutler, who won an Emmy award in 2001 for American High and produced The War Room, the Oscar-nominated documentary about Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign. Cutler's other producing credits include the TV series 30 Days and Black/White.
If you're interested in finding out more, go to the HBO Web site and download the Thin discussion guide. For a poignant, fictional take on the topic, Natasha Friend's novel Perfect is an excellent choice.
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LanguageOne woman liberally uses "f--k" and "s--t." |
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Social BehaviorDevastating portrayal of the toll of eating disorders. Graphic moments include discussion of purging and vomiting, suicidal thoughts, and attempted suicide scars on wrists. Endoscopy of stomach is shown. |
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Drug/Alcohol/TobaccoLots of smoking and prescription drug use and abuse. |
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