From the director: My documentary ‘The Body I Live In’ helps to empower women, by taking an inside look at the cultural/personal effects of fat-shaming, within the scope of my relationship with my fiancé. Having faced the abuse, fat-shaming, and mainstream media focus on the way a woman “should” look all my life, it’s left me pretty broken, in terms of how I view my body. While I traverse a romantic relationship with another woman, I try to come to terms with my body images issues. My fiancé, a caring and supportive woman, tries to show me how beautiful she sees me and helps me work through my own personal issues of fat-shaming. Having seen and experienced the way that fat women are told they deserve to be seen/treated in relationships, my documentary aims to counteract that narrative. My personal narrative documentary was made in the hopes of empowering women see that fat women do deserve to be in loving and respectful relationships, using my personal story as an example.
View the trailer below, and learn more about the film here.
Sam is a documentary filmmaker, with a focus on feminist, women, and LGBTQ+ issues, with a specific regard to body politics. Sam’s work is motivated by the need for diversity; diversity in the bodies that are in films, and diversity in topics of films. Sam works under the principle of having intersectional and multifaceted stories that work to bring women's voices to film. Sam received her BA in Film at Humboldt State University and is currently working towards earning her MFA at San Francisco State University. 