Filmmaker Natalie Erika James
Photo courtesy of IFC Films
by Rosalie Kicks, Editor in Chief and Old Sport
I have been following Natalie Erika James’ filmmaking career since I first caught her debut feature, Relic at Sundance in 2020. With each new film she has released since, she has undoubtedly proven to be one of the greatest writer/directors working today. Her unique and fearless vision often has her grappling with topics that many would shy away from. In her latest picture, Saccharine, Natalie sheds light on a deeply personal subject, a real-life horror that plagues many individuals, eating disorders.
I recently had the opportunity to chat with Natalie about her writing and production process, as well as some of the challenges she faced during the making of the film. Saccharine is presently in select theaters and on demand.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Rosalie Kicks (RK): What inspired this story?
Natalie Erika James (NEJ): I think, like Relic, it came from a really personal place. So, growing up, my parents, as you probably can extrapolate from the film, really had opposite approaches to how they dealt with food and their bodies. I think I always had a sense that I wanted to explore this through film, the kind of mixed messaging that I got and the work I’ve had to do to unpack all of that.
I really wanted to convey the feeling of being in the grips of an eating disorder, and how it can feel like it’s both within you, but also like there’s something outside of you that’s kind of taking control. I always knew I wanted to convey that through horror in some way, and this kind of sinister presence that has Hannah, taking on the logic of the Picture of Dorian Gray. So the more she eats the larger the ghost gets, much like the painting getting older. The Ashpill was the thing that supernaturally linked them together. So that was the starting point.
RK: Why did you feel that you were the one to tell this story?
NEJ: I think like a lot of people growing up in the 2000s, the messaging that particularly young women were being exposed to [about] diet culture in the tabloids was that people’s, women’s bodies, were being completely torn apart, criticized, and dissected. I think that has an impact. As much as people tell you while you’re growing up, oh, you know, love yourself. It [the messaging from media] kind of permeates the culture, right? And it’s kind of inescapable. In my earlier teenage years, I definitely struggled with having an eating disorder and disordered eating over the years. It felt like, while I’ve been on this kind of path to recovery, there’s definitely moments in which it felt kind of inescapable.
While the film might be, particularly if you think about the end of the film, a cautionary tale, but for me, it really is one of hope, the message, you know, because I think looking back to that time and how different things are for me now. I guess my ultimate kind of desire making the film was to express that there is a way out, that it’s not something that has to consume you completely.
RK: What type of challenges did you face during the production?
NEJ: I would say some of the hardest, technically difficult kind of sequences are the kind of marrying practical effects with visual effects and when you do things in camera it’s always very finicky.
Even things like the scene where she’s (Midori Francis as Hana) being kind of pinned to the ground and everything’s kind of compressed, there’s some VFX in that. The base of that was practical, and this kind of rig that compressed the jacket that she’s wearing, and all sorts of visual tricks that just take a long time to orchestrate. That was certainly very challenging and things like when Bertha is kind of crawling across the bed. The way that we achieved that practically was – it seems ridiculous to even talk about – vacuum cleaners that were like sucking in the mattress to give that effect. Of course, when you have a set like that, there’s just so much chaos and even the noise of that; those things are really fun to figure out, but there certainly was a lot of meetings about that mattress.
RK: What are you hoping viewers take away from the film?
NEJ: There’s a few kind of levels to it. I would say, like for anyone who hasn’t experienced something similar, my hope is that it can be like an insight into that experience and kind of be a route for understanding or empathy.
Whereas, in terms of self-love, which is a term that like gets thrown around a lot, but, what does that actually look like? I think if people can see that scene with Hana looking at her younger self and take something from that. It can even just be a moment of understanding for your younger self and ultimately the idea that self-love is not a place that you arrive at, it’s an ongoing practice and a process that requires vigilance. I think, even in making this film, it forced me and some other people to confront some of the kind of historical thought patterns that you can get into, as well and the work that you have to do to keep, yourself on that path to recovery in a way.
There’s always kind of these things that pop up that we have to deal with. I also think, just the nature of any time you are outsourcing your sense of value or your sense of worth in yourself, whether it’s through other things that you use to fill up a void in yourself or through other people, and that’s what that kind of remaining image is for me. It’s kind of like the endpoint of that, a sense of desire that becomes possessive and becomes almost consumptive.
Midori Francis appears in Saccharine
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Shudder.
RK: How did you get your actors into character for the film, specifically Midori Francis, I thought she was excellent.
NEJ: Yeah she’s so incredible. I feel like this is a role that you haven’t really seen her play before as well. She often plays very bright, kind of, sunshine characters, which is very reflective of who she is, but there’s so much depth to her.
For us in terms of process, we connected instantly after she had read the script. We broke down the script over a bunch of zoom sessions leading up to her coming down to Australia to shoot the film. It was an incredible thing; there’s was a lot of alignment and a lot of common language that you develop over the course of these like kind of pre-pre-discussions. Coming into the camera tests, she came on like as soon as the camera was on her. She’s got the clothes on, we tried the prosthetics, all of those things, and her physicality completely changed. This was due to all the work that she did coming into it. She’s extraordinary.
RK: Is there any particular scene in the film that really stands out that you’re most proud of?
NEJ: I think the one of the scenes that stands out to me is the candy bar scene. It’s kind of the first scene in which the presence becomes almost more sinister or kind of turns on her (Hana). Up until that point, there’s a sense that they’re almost almost working together. I feel as though it accurately conveys the sense of food noise and the feeling of being prisoner to something that is also giving you a sense of numbing out or pleasure or whatever it is. The duality of that, I suppose.
RK: You mentioned this idea of food noise and I found the sound design within the film to be excellent. Can you talk about this collaboration – I believe it was with Hannah Peel?
NEJ: Yes and Robert McKenzie, who also was my sound designer for Relic, as well as Apartment 7A. It was definitely a collaboration between the three of us and Hannah was incredible. I always put together a playlist as I’m writing projects, and she happened to be on my playlist. We were searching for composers and just talking to some agents, and her agent was like, oh I actually rep this person who’s often on your playlist. She (Hannah) has this album called “Particles in Space” and I felt like it was in line with Hana’s internal worlds in a way, or like what she would listen to. Process wise, it’s very much like sketches. It was really gratifying creative partnership.
RK: Did you have movies that you found inspiration from?
NEJ: I think the more obvious ones that you can probably see are films such as Shame or It Follows. I also looked to the world that Hannah inhabits as a medical student and I guess her being a loner. Some of the films that I took inspiration from for that were, to a certain degree, American Mary and Autopsy of Jane Doe; horror within a medical setting and films that explore the idea of lust and obsession really well. I was just talking earlier today about My Summer of Love, which kind of has similar obsessive qualities in the central relationship between the two characters.
RK: What does the future hold for you?
NEJ: I’m actually doing my first kind of TV project, which is very exciting. It is definitely one that’s in the horror genre and it follows a documentary maker who’s interviewing survivors of a doomsday cult from the early seventies. The more she digs into things, the more people claim supernatural things were happening, and this starts to kind of infiltrate her own life.
RK: My final question is purely MovieJawn related… if you were stuck on a deserted island, what movie are you taking with you?
NEJ: I want to say something practical so that I could learn some skills… but the first one that comes to mind is Velvet Goldmine. It’s something that’s fun and full of levity, but like, you know, incredible imagery and would take my mind off the horrific situation of being stuck on an island.
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