Everyone has different reasons for wanting to lose weight. For filmmaker and 49-year-old single mother Noriko “Yuka” Sekiguchi, one reason is to keep up with her seven-year-old son, Amol. But mostly Sekiguchi just wants to be healthier and happier, and in Fat Chance, she documents her six-month effort to get in shape by her 50th birthday. During her upbringing in Yokohama, Japan, Sekiguchi's rice-merchant father promoted—much to her mother's chagrin—a Western-style diet (he developed Type II diabetes in his 40s). Sekiguchi, who was always overweight, was needled by her neighbors, but after moving to Sydney, Australia in her early 20s to attend college, she immediately felt at home because she noticed a lot of other “fatties.” After a later divorce, however, Sekiguchi's chocolate and pizza binges increased, leading to even greater weight gains. Although she tried every kind of diet, all failed, so her new regimen begins with exercise and meetings with a variety of experts, ranging from a psychotherapist and an obesity specialist to a plastic surgeon. Sekiguchi holds nothing back: the camera catches everything, and some might feel she bares too much, both physically and psychologically, but the director believes that shame is a powerful motivator. Starting at nearly 200 pounds, six months later Sekiguchi hasn't lost the 75 pounds she hoped to shed, but her therapist and her mother have helped her figure out what she needs to do to get her life back on track. Surprisingly, the cure has little to do with diet and exercise. Fat Chance starts out as a film about weight, but winds up being a film about culture. As Sekiguchi discovers, it can be difficult to change your future without first making peace with your past. Recommended. Aud: C, P. (K. Fennessy)
Fat Chance
(2007) 52 min. DVD: $390. Icarus Films. PPR. Closed captioned. Volume 24, Issue 2
Fat Chance
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