Plastic People

Plastic People Review

An incidental insight from Ben Addelman’s and Ziya Tong’s disconcerting documentary, Plastic People, is how long false advertising claims from bygone eras have lasted as assumed facts in our collective knowledge. Milk is good for you, juice is an excellent source of vitamins, and plastic is something of a marvel material—capable of adjusting its features to whatever is needed. Rigid or soft, elastic or sturdy, transparent or opaque, it is endlessly modifiable, readily available, easy to discard and ridiculously cheap. It is also harmful and, not to put too fine a point on it, deadly. That knowledge instantly turns its appealing pluses into dangerous detriments, not least because plastic is truly everywhere.

The unsettling omnipresence of the titular component doesn’t stop at the stomachs of seabirds swollen with plastic waste or in the cluttered beaches in South East Asia and the Global South. Plastic and microplastics can also be found in our brains, as a neurosurgeon and a neurological specialist explain to co-director Tong, and there they can contribute to severe cognitive impairments such as dementia and Alzheimer’s, among other major medical issues. Plastic has literally gone to our head. Advertising has trained us to perceive plastic products as colourful, clean and harmless, when the reverse is the case. It is at this point that some of the limitations of this alarming documentary become clear.

While the taking-heads style doesn’t make for particularly engaging visuals, this diligent digest of plastic’s history of harm takes care to back its depictions and statements with clear science and data. However, the socio-structural impact of plastic and its resulting problems, along with suggestions of suitable alternatives, is only hinted at. That the already disadvantaged people most affected by microplastics and toxins could also be the ones hardest hit by a plastic ban, making essential products unavailable or inaccessible, is never explored. Nevertheless, the concise documentary’s findings around the invasive nature of plastics are important to establish. Especially since the titular product is much harder to get out of one’s system than ad slogans.

Plastic People: The Hidden Crisis of Microplastics screened as part of this year’s Tallin Black Nights Film Festival. It is screening at festivals and in local communities across the world into early 2025, before premiering on CBC later this Spring.

Editor’s Note: That Shelf Managing Editor Emma Badame is the digital strategist for Plastic People and its impact campaign, via Good Measure Productions.



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