Thirst

A brief, artistic meditation upon eating disorders, filmmaker Jessica Joy Wise's Thirst is a collage of voiceovers, photographs, and scattered scenarios depicting the thoughts of Tammy Ballaban, a young woman suffering through and eventually coming to terms with anorexia nervosa. The scenes range from dreamlike reenactments of episodes from school and home life, to attention-grabbing, carnival-esque images of tightrope walkers, barkers, and carousels that reflect the nightmarish loss of innocence associated with this self-inflicted and life-threatening disease. No medical professionals or family members provide an outsider's perspective; instead the focus is entirely on the thoughts of one young woman who has survived a very lonely internal struggle. While unconventional and perhaps a little tremulous in its presentation, Thirst nevertheless effectively illustrates a painful self-awakening. Ballaban acknowledges in her rambling manner that becoming “the anorexic” was her best chance for gaining sympathy (“I wasn't as smart as my friends but nobody could starve themselves like I could”), but while she initially equated being thin with “having a life,” she later realized that holding onto her eating disorder really meant trying to hang on to her childhood. Shedding some light on the bewildering psychology of eating disorders, this is recommended for larger health and teen collections. Aud: H, C, P. (A. Cantú)