Half Ton Mom Analysis

Documentary: Half Ton Mom
Documentary type: Mixed documentary containing narration

Narrative structure
the documentary is a linear story with a beginning, middle and end. The beginning starts off with the mum talking about her daughters and how she can not care for them because she is bed bound from being obese. This then goes onto the middle which is the mum having a gastric band so she can loose some weight and start looking after her children. The ending is then about how much weight she has lost and how her life is different from before.

Themesthere are many themes which run throughout this documentary and these are obese, children, caring, hospitals and operations.

Mise En SceneMost of the documentary is set in her home as she cannot get out of bed so the mise en scene will be her home and where she is in the house. When the documentary is not in the house there is an interview with the hospital doctor this is set in the hospital where there is relevant mise en scene. The mise en scene for the hospital is the green curtains, a computer, the operating table and all the equipment which will be used for the operation. There is then interviews with the family members where there is a blue screen used and they have changed the background to videos of her when she was a child.

Graphicsthere is plain simple white graphics which is used and this is so that the attention is not distracted from the most important thing on the screen which is the interview which is taking place.

Camera Workthere are a wide range of camera angle and shots which are used throughout this documentary such as a zoom on the woman’s face when she starts getting upset about her childhood and where she ends up now. There is then a mid shot of the woman so you can see how big she is, the pan of the room so you can see all the equipment she needs to help her through life. There are zooms in on her arms and legs, there are long shots of her to compare her so that we can see her against every day objects so the audience can get a feel for her size. Extreme close ups on her face when she’s talking so the main focus is her face.

Soundsambient sounds of her heavy breathing, there is ambient sounds of the hospital when she is having the operation for example the sounds of the tools going on the mat.

Archive Footage
there is archive footage throughout the documentary and this is things such as her as a child to show the audience what she used to be like. This will be shown over the top of her talking. There is also footage of her having the operation and footage of her children as babies. There is footage of other obese people being lifted out by fire trucks.