Fat Chance (1994)
The terrific 1994 documentary Fat Chance follows Rick Zakowich, a 400 pound man struggling to lose weight and to come to terms with his situation. We learn a lot about Rick, from his talents as a singer and good works as counselor to abused children, to his self-loathing and gradual retreat from social relationships as he struggles with his identity as an obese man. Eventually, in the midst of another failed diet, Rick sets out, with the help of a doctor also struggling with his weight, to find a community of support and to learn to accept himself as a valuable human being in spite of a society that belittles him at every turn.
The first half of Fat Chance, directed by Jeff McKay, is particularly powerful and instructive about the lives of obese people. What many people don't understand is the mental aspect of obesity. As Rick notes, many people just assume that fat people are dumb, lazy, or lack self-control. As a society these days we seem to have more compassion for those addicted to heroin or alcohol than those addicted to food (even though only one of those addictions involves something that every human must take in order to survive).
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