An Australian director and actor, Damon Gameau, decides to test whether sugar is harmful to the body. His girlfriend is pregnant, and who, if not a future father, should think about healthy eating. Having gathered several doctors, Gameau calculates that for the purity of the experiment, he needs to eat 40 tablespoons of sugar a day (Gold, 2015). For 60 days, he documents his experiment, eating food from supermarkets marked as “healthy.” By the 12th day of the experiment, Gameau gains 3.5 kilograms, while by the end of the experiment, he gains 10+ kilograms, 10 centimeters at his waist, and a predisposition to diabetes (Dalton, 2015). In “That Sugar Film” documentary, Gameau effectively uses emotional appeals to persuade the target audience, refers to the opinions of doctors to prove credibility, and implements visual techniques to make his arguments clear and simple to the viewers. However, the author is ineffective in connecting some facts with his message, which makes the documentary biased to some extent.
The director of “That Sugar Film” emotionally begins with mentioning a consumerist culture that stimulates people to buy more and more food with sugar. He criticizes the obsession with sugar-containing drinks and foods, claiming that it impacts not only bodies but also minds. It is also stated that the foods marked as “healthy” can contain hidden sugar, and it leads to excessive weight gain. The main emotional appeal of the documentary is the relevance of the topic since currently the world experiences a significant growth of obesity and related health problems. It provides useful and important information that any person thinking about his or her health should know about. These are not only the well-known general points about the dangers of sweets, but also how much one actually eats, how it affects, and what negative health effects can be expected.
The film is created in quite an exciting fashion that engages viewers. It uses different types of shooting and computer animation. For example, nutrition experts broadcast directly from the packaging of various products, and animated characters make a journey into the human body. The music is played by Depeche Mode, The Machine, and Peter Gabriel and Florence. At the same time, Gameau recruited such actors as Hugh Jackman and Stephen Fry, talking about sugar and healthy foods. Considering that well-known actors and music groups are involved in the movie, it increases its credibility and trustworthiness. Accordingly, those who were not so interested in this film can discover that it is worth to continue watching.
The presentation of facts and arguments in the film looks like a kaleidoscope. In one hour forty minutes of the screen time, the author includes vintage commercials of carbonated drinks, an Indian tribe in the current realities, retro and modern filming in America, and much more. There are streams of platelets moving through the veins made through computer graphics with a person riding a platelet, as well as encyclopedic information voiced by professional actors. All this makes the documentary something special – like a carousel at a fair, which spins with fun music at a crazy pace. At the same time, the director offers a solution to this socially important theme, suggesting that nutrition education is necessary for adults all over the world to critically evaluate the impact of foods and drinks they consume on their health. This solution calls the target audience to act immediately, at least by increasing their awareness of sugar in fruits and other “healthy” products. In other words, it encourages people to react to the message being translated.
However, in his attempt to prove that sugar is a white death, it seems that the director goes too far. For example, for some reason, he shows an unfortunate 18-year-old American guy who has lost almost all his teeth from the constant use of Mountain Dew, or Aboriginal people who drink Coca-Cola. The way these scenes relate to “healthy food” remains unclear. It seems that the author is a little disingenuous and is not talking about real healthy food, but only about the one that is advertised and positioned as healthy. In addition, Gameau uses a journalist’s favorite weapon and talks about the sugar lobby and conspiracy theory. The documentary mentions that all scientific research in defense of sugar is done with the money of the “sugar” companies”. The author accuses big corporations of clouding the brains of ordinary citizens with various marketing strategies. At the same time, he also plays on the suggestibility of the viewers, making them believe that mangoes and nuts will save their lives.
To conclude, “That Sugar Film” documentary presents an experiment of Damon Gameau, who tried to explore the harmful impact of hidden sugar in foods and drinks. To persuade the target audience, namely, adults all over the world, the director refers to emotional and social arguments, as well as mentions the views of different experts. The visual techniques used in the film also support the claims made to attract public attention to the problem of obesity. A one-sided focus on the negative effects of sugar and a lack of consistency between some facts and their relation to the topic being discussed are the weak points of this documentary.
References
Dalton, S. (2015). ‘That Sugar Film’: Film review. The Hollywood Reporter. Web.
Gold, D. M. (2015). Review: In ‘That Sugar Film,’ a bitter truth. The New York Times. Web.