a review of "to the bone"

i went into watching "to the bone" rather blindly. having not read any reviews or anything about the movie, but just knowing the basic general premise.

and i walked in rather blindly in thinking it wouldn't be triggering. so this must be said first and foremost. as someone who hasn't battled their eating disorder for a while and would consider themselves very much recovered, the very nature of this film is triggering in every imaginable way. be cautious. be smart. no movie is worth relapsing or sinking into old patterns, behaviors, or thoughts you purged.

i was excited for the movie just from the perspective of being a huge Lily Collins fan and loving any movie she is in.

but, this movie was entirely disappointing from an educational or helpful perspective.

here are my complaints with the film.

1. the main character plays a thin, white woman who is wealthy.

Ellen or Eli, Lily Collins' character is thin, white, abled, and the epitome of privileged. It can be seen from the luxury vehicle that her stepmom drives around and the fact that she has been through 4 inpatient treatment programs. money is clearly not an issue.

2. they had an opportunity to educate, but instead furthered the idea that eating disorders can only look one way.

this is possibly the most frustrating aspect of this movie for me. they took stereotypical symptoms from anorexia and put it in the stereotypical gaunt, bones sticking out, white woman package. you can call that a great many things, but educational is not one of those things.

i was excited when they had a "fat" black woman who was in the inpatient program with Eli. they could do so many things with this! but what did they do? this woman spoke less than four lines. in the most revealing part of the mindset that fueled this movie, when discussing bulimia with another girl in the program, the said black girl--whom I don't even know her name she was so minor and essentially just was used at the token black character for "diversity" purposes--said something to the effect of she "wished she could barf, but she only binged."

because apparently only larger women can binge. they can't have eating disorders.

i cannot physically roll my eyes and be sarcastic enough when i say that. i was seriously disappointed.

you. had. an. opportunity. and. you. blew. it.

this furthered the idea that the only people that can really have eating disorders are white, abled, wealthy, and gaunt.

women are having to fight to prove their eating disorder when they are a healthy or overweight BMI. and this film showed that mindset. and i would argue, encourages this mindset.

if they were hell bent on showing a thin, abled, white, wealthy woman as one of the sufferers of anorexia, then do so. but also show the lives of other women. women of color. women of size and shape. disabled women. VARIETY. because in the non-Hollywood world, these women are just as apt to suffer with anorexia, maybe even more so, than some thin white abled woman.

eating disorders don't discriminate so why pretend like they do?

this was seriously disappointing from an educational standpoint.

from the standpoint of Hollywood creating an entertaining, emotional story. they did that. but at the expense of furthering the mentality that eating disorders can only look one certain way.

as i watched this film i went to this place mentally. i didn't look that sick when i was sick. my cheeks weren't sunken in. my shoulder bones didn't jut out abnormally. by all standards, and by my BMI i was definitely underweight but nothing of "actual concern." but that's the thing. i was sick. because sick doesn't just look like that. sick can look a million different ways. and just because it doesn't mimic a series of exclusive stereotypes that are "cues" to someone have an eating disorder means nothing. eating disorders cannot be categorized by physical appearance or by stereotypes.

i didn't lose my period. i ate quite a lot. but i only ate once a day. i ate restrictively all day and binged at night. does that mean that therefore i didn't have an eating disorder? no. not at all. movies like this attempt to be helpful but end up being incredibly harmful.

it goes to show we cannot rely on mainstream media to accurately portray the truths of eating disorders and their appearance, or more accurately, their lack of appearance.

it's up to us.