No-one would be fooled into believing gummy bears are good for you. However,That Sugar Filmdoes not focus on the usual suspects when it comes to sugar and its effects on our health. It exposes an industry built on hidden sugars in products that are deceptively branded as healthy.
This gonzo documentary is the brainchild of Australian actor and former Tropfest winner Damon Gameau. Pulling the pin on his clean living lifestyle, he undertakes his own Super Size Me experiment. After restocking his refrigerator with all sorts of packaged and pre-prepared foods, Gameau vows to ingest 40 teaspoons of sugar per day. This is a dramatically high though relatively common amount to consume – yet it’s more than four times the limit suggested by the World Health Organisation.
At the end of a rollercoaster 60 days, Gameau wraps up the challenge. Although he was monitored by health professionals, he was on the brink of permanent damage. “The main problem was my fatty liver,” he says. “It gets to a point where it starts to harden and scar – they call it cirrhosis. That can be a bit dangerous. But as soon as I went back to my normal way of eating, all the symptoms disappeared within two months. We were surprised by how quickly that happened – that’s why we left it in the film.”
Stepping into the shoes of a sugar addict, he also battled some serious mood swings, one of the more unexpected consequences of his new diet. “Towards the end, it was a real struggle,” Gameau says. “I was trying to concentrate, but I was very snappy and edgy with people. And I think that kind of behaviour might apply to people who don’t even know it, who haven’t experienced what it might be like without sugar.”
The film features some high-profile appearances from the likes of Stephen Fry and Hugh Jackman. They each deliver a rhythmic monologue, backgrounded by visual effects illustrating the history and impact of sugar consumption. “Hugh responded to the tone of the film and getting the message out to kids,” explains Gameau. “Then I wrote the sketch about sugar and thought, ‘Who is the best person to do this?’ And obviously it was Stephen Fry. He’s the planet’s schoolteacher; if you want anyone to teach you something it’s him. He got straight back to me and said he’d battled with sugar addiction as a child and it’s an issue that’s very dear to him.”
The aesthetic of That Sugar Film reaches beyond the typical documentary formula. With visual quirks like talking heads superimposed on food packaging, it’s colourful and inventive – quite an upbeat approach to a serious issue. In many ways, the film mirrors what it’s like to be seduced by sugar. “Definitely,” agrees Gameau, “we use similar tactics that the food companies use to sell their product, except we try to invert the message.” The effort to entertain also speaks to the target audience of children and families.
Indeed, it seems we’re saturated by the wrong messages. We’ve been hardwired to equate foods’ fat content with, well, fat. We’re obsessive calorie counters, but in reality, different calories do different things. “It’s very sad,” says Gameau. “The more you research it, you start seeing where we didn’t make the decisions at key times. I guess we’ve got to be careful that we don’t say sugar is the entire problem, because I certainly don’t think that’s the case.”
So how does the food revolution progress from here? “The government has all sorts of stakes in the food industry and untangling those webs will take time,” Gameau says. “I’m pretty confident that if we have stronger education, the public will start demanding change. This might be an idealistic way of looking at it, but my hope is that something will start at a grassroots level and eventually there will be government intervention.”
That Sugar Filmis touring various cinemas around Sydney and Newcastle, Monday March 9 – Thursday March 12.
