We are living in a culture right now where we are constantly feeding ourselves, and not only with food. The content constantly competing for our attention on all sizes of screens, particularly those residing in our pockets, is what takes up the majority of our attention on a daily basis. The need to comment on the content, and then hear back from people who read your content, is the never-ending death loop people find themselves in nowadays. Certain parts of ourselves waste away as a result of these circuitous traps. As a result of those damn algorithms, the content we consume is accompanied by ads force-feeding you solutions on making yourself look better, whether it’s a special cream, a new kind of botox, or quick fixes to make yourself lose five to ten pounds. It can all be exhausting.
So when I watched Natalie Erika James’ new film, “Saccharine,” I was immediately struck by its portrayal of the world in which we currently live, and how its problems are only being exacerbated by AI. The story itself concerns literal food consumption, and the internal struggle with weight experienced by its protagonist, a medical student named Hana (played by Midori Francis). When she finds a possible “cure-all” drug solution for her emotional eating routines, she finds herself haunted by the sinister spirit whose ashes reside in the pill she’s taking daily.
I’ve had the privilege of speaking with Natalie about all of her feature efforts for Cinema Femme, beginning with “Relic” in 2020 and then “Apartment 7A” in 2024. All three of these films share a connective tissue in how they bring universal internal struggles to the screen in a horrifically external way, whether it’s an older woman who is losing her memory, a young woman in the aftermath of sexual assault, or a woman who struggles with food.
I actually got to meet Erika in-person this year at Sundance. Though I was unable to see the film there, I did get to attend a panel in which she spoke about storytelling for indie films, and the importance of getting your work seen in a theatrical setting. I’m so happy I can elevate her and her work before the movie’s Chicago release. With her gorgeous production design and practical effects, I strongly encourage everyone to see a Natalie Erika James film in theaters. “Saccharine” is now screening in New York and LA, and will have its Chicago release on Friday, May 22nd, at AMC Theatres.
Can you talk about the inception of this film, and what makes this story so personal to you?
This film has been lodged in my brain for a long time. There was definitely a period in my life where my relationships with my parents were pretty comparable to what you see in the story. Growing up, they were really on opposite ends of the spectrum in how they related to food and their bodies.
I grew up with a lot of mixed messages, and underneath all of that, there was always a lot of shame surrounding weight. It was very tied up with ideas of self-worth. My desire to tell this story came from wanting to unpack those ideas.
And horror just felt like the right genre for it. When you talk about eating disorders and food noise, there’s often this sense of a presence — something that feels both internal and external at the same time, almost like relinquishing control to something else. That felt particularly suited to a ghost story.
The idea of ashes and consuming ashes also tied naturally into themes of the afterlife and the body itself becoming something consumable. The starting point was almost imagining a Picture of Dorian Gray-type logic, except instead of the painting aging, the ghost becomes larger the more she consumes.
Could you also talk about your collaboration with Midori? I’m sure it was a very collaborative process emotionally, especially considering the depths she had to go to in the performance.
Yeah, Midori was incredible — so committed. She’s in almost every frame of the film, and for any actor, that schedule alone is relentless. But she was completely up for the challenge and brought so much energy to it.
She also had to spend hours in the makeup chair for prosthetics on certain days, which is an incredible amount of work on top of everything else. And because of the way we shot the film, she constantly had to shift between different stages of Hannah’s journey since we couldn’t shoot chronologically.
But she was fearless. There are a lot of heightened, absurd moments in the film, and one of Midori’s strengths is that she’s incredibly tonally adept. She can balance multiple things at once. She always kept the emotional truth of the character front and center, which allowed her to fully commit to the more absurd moments without ever playing them for comedy. That was one of the really special things she brought to it.
And Danielle Macdonald — I feel like she’s always in these emotionally intense films. She was just in “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You” with Rose Byrne. How did you go about casting her? I thought her dynamic with Midori was fantastic.
Yeah, that was exactly it. We needed someone who could act as a foil to Hannah — someone with a grounded presence and a real ease within themselves, which Danny absolutely has. There’s such an openness to her, but also this understated bullishness. You can see that in “Patti Cake$,” which was the first film I saw her in years ago.
And she and Midori hit it off instantly. We had rehearsals, and even before they officially started, they had to go take some photos together for the art department. They came back acting like best friends already. That chemistry was so important because friendship chemistry can be just as essential as romantic chemistry onscreen. She was an incredible choice.
I appreciate the relationship because in a lot of body horror films, women are positioned against each other and everything becomes about competition. But here, she was genuinely there for Hannah, even when she thought she might be losing it.
I also wanted to ask about the practical effects because I know that’s something you do so well. Could you talk about the importance of practical effects in this film?
Definitely. In every film, there are certain elements you absolutely have to get right or the whole thing falls apart, and for this one, the prosthetics were definitely one of those elements.
There was so much involved — not just the dissections and cadavers, but Bertha’s presence and the different stages she goes through as she grows, plus Midori’s own physical transformation. We took a lot of care to ensure the prosthetics enhanced Midori’s performance rather than overwhelming it.
We wanted everything to feel as seamless and naturalistic as possible. Traditionally, prosthetics used to depict larger bodies are often treated as a punchline, and we wanted the exact opposite of that. Hannah still looks like herself. What she’s struggling with is internal — it’s not some “ugly duckling” transformation story. In fact, it’s almost the reverse: the smaller she becomes, the more unhealthy she actually is.
That was really important to us. And with the dissection scenes and all those tactile visuals, we really wanted audiences to feel the physicality of everything. Doing as much as possible in-camera felt like the right approach.
Yeah, I definitely felt it. I also love that your films consistently take these deeply internal struggles and externalize them through horror. I don’t know if you could talk about the connective tissue between this film and your earlier work, because I think that comes across so powerfully.
Absolutely. I think that’s one of horror’s greatest strengths — the ability to externalize what’s internal. Ideally, the metaphor works on multiple layers so it isn’t completely literal, but still gives audiences something nuanced to unpack.
With “Relic,” for example, the comparison is pretty direct — the deterioration of the mind manifesting physically in the body. Here, it’s more about self-erasure and what that looks like physically.
And with “Apartment 7A,” my aim was more to explore the echoes of sexual assault. That theme isn’t as foregrounded as it is in “Relic” or “Saccharine,” but it’s still part of the DNA of the film.
Right, absolutely. Every film feels distinct and creative in its own way, but there’s always this emotional depth to them.
What do you hope audiences take away from this film?
For me, the most important takeaway is self-compassion. When you’re in the middle of an internal struggle — especially something like an eating disorder — that idea can feel very distant or abstract. It can feel impossible to even understand what self-compassion means.
But I hope that through Hana looking at a younger version of herself with love and acceptance, audiences can understand what the beginning of recovery might feel like. That’s really the core of it for me.
I feel a lot of people will connect to that, especially considering the culture we’re surrounded by now — social media, algorithms, all of it.
Exactly. I think the biggest thing is that these feelings can make you feel trapped, like there’s no escape from them. I certainly felt that way when I was younger. So while the film is very confronting, especially for people who’ve experienced those struggles, I still hope it ultimately feels hopeful in some way.
