Mid-Level Review: To The Bone

A Mid-Level Review done for a composition class.

To the Bone is a movie about a girl named Ellen who suffers from anorexia. Through conspicuous examples and a sort of stilted explanation, To the Bone tries to educate us about the ins and outs of diagnosis. The unconventional doctor has different methods of treatment, but do they work? A good movie should provide answers for the viewers, if there's no cliffhanger leading to a second movie. In this case, there's no cliffhanger. 

As a movie shown to viewers that may struggle with the same issues, you'd think the film would show Ellen making progress. Wrong. All we see is an angry and defiant girl trying to kill herself. There are very few progression scenes, which can make it seem impossible to heal for some people. It's hard to come back from a disease like that, we all know that. Making this movie, though, was an opportunity to show people all over the world that it's possible to survive. That opportunity was foregone. 

Usually, films become intense and interesting at some point, but the lack of imagery is almost shocking. Ellen's art inspires another woman with anorexia to take her own life, and it's only briefly mentioned. We are never shown an image of the woman who took her own life, her parents, or the picture that drove her to that point. All we find out is that the woman killed herself because of Ellen, and even though she doesn't say it, we're supposed to assume she hates herself for it? That it's one of the reasons she starves herself? An answer to the questions that pop up would've made the movie at least a 4-star film (out of 5), but as of right now it's about a 2.5. 

There are only two therapy scenes in To the Bone. Someone with a severe disease like anorexia should receive more therapy in that time period, which spans at least six weeks in the home. If it's based on a real experience, it should be realistic. There's group therapy, which is important, but we only see one time that Ellen talks to her doctor alone. Again, we see no progress. We see her illness and how it has worsened. We see optimistic moments, sure, like when she lays off the exercise, but the whole attitude of the film should be optimistic. Instead, it seems to romanticize the illness. 

Doctor Beckham encourages Ellen to change her identity by changing her name. Ellen decides on Eli, and sticks with it. The name doesn't seem to help her, but she seems a little happier to be known as someone besides Ellen. She goes out to dinner with Luke, a British dancer suffering from anorexia, and refuses to swallow any of the food. They scam the waiter into thinking they have cancer so they can drink alcohol, but Eli doesn't touch it. Having this extended scene where Eli is chewing and then spitting food into a napkin is sort of unnecessary and to be frank, gross. She ends up alienating him and running away anyway. 

Towards the end of the movie, there is a scene where Eli is talking with her mother about what might help her. Her mother says she heard feeding Eli from a bottle, like when she was a baby, has been found to be therapeutic. First of all, this scene is awkward and there's no explanation afterwards. There's no "it worked" or "it didn't work". There's no conclusion! Just like a good essay, a good movie should have a conclusion.