Documentary Review: 'Plastic People' Debuts at SXSW

Plastic People (2024)

Directed by Ben Addelman, Ziya Tong

Written by Ben Addelman

Starring Ziya Tong

Release Date March 9th, 2024, at SXSW

We are no longer Homo-Sapiens, we've evolved, we're now Homo-Plasticus. That's not my observation, that is the observation of scientist and doctor Sedat Gundogdu. Dr. Gundogdu has been tracking microplastics around the globe from his home in Turkey. As hard as it can be to wrap your head around it, plastic doesn't go away. Every plastic item you have ever encountered, still exists in some fashion. Plastic breaks down over time but it will aways exist. That plastic has to go somewhere and in scientific test after test, so-called Microplastics are being found in the last place you'd think to look or even be able to look, your own body.

The documentary Plastic People, debuting at the SXSW Film Festival on March 9th, is a halting, breathtaking and frightening warning and call to action. The documentary lays out the case that we desperately need to cut back on our reliance on plastic or risk a continuously worsening health crisis. Microplastics can cause cancer, developmental delays in children, and any other number of ailments that we are still and yet to discover. And, if we keep unknowingly ingesting these tiny pieces of plastic, we have no idea what even greater harm might befall humanity in the future.

Plastic People unfolds a series of smaller stories that feeds into a larger story about how and why microplastics have been making their way into the human body. One such sequence follows the co-director of Plastic People, Ziya Tong using her own body to prove the growing issue of microplastics in the human body. Tong undergoes a blood test and a test of her feces and each return results that show particles of microplastic in her body. Researchers have been seeking people to test for microplastics and even when testing people who aren't making a documentary about microplastics, the results were the same.

Another vignette takes us to the University of Minnesota where they are testing the air for microplastics. They are literally just sweeping the air and coming away with tiny particles of plastic that you and I are breathing in everyday. If you don't already know, every piece of plastic ever produced, still exists. Plastic doesn't go away. It degrades but it never goes away. It just becomes smaller and smaller until it is small enough to be blown around by the wind and end up in your lungs and traveling through your body.

In perhaps the most harrowing vignette, among many, in Plastic People we watch as tests are being conducted after a woman gives birth. The placenta is removed, and the placenta is tested for microplastics. The tests come back positive. There can be no doubt that if microplastics are in the placenta, then there are microplastics in the baby as well. But, the doctors here are even more curious and have one more question: Are there microplastics in breast milk? You can presume the answer based on the evidence but I urge you to see Plastic People for yourself for the answer.

And these are just a few examples of what you will find in Plastic People. This is one of the most comprehensive, terrifying and necessary documentaries I've ever seen. I'm shaken, deeply grossed out and motivated to want to get cut back on plastic in my own life. And that's what we have to do, we have to demand a cutback in the creation of needless plastic. Plastic has been desperately, needlessly over-produced. We don't need most of the plastic that corporations insist on continuing to create in effort to maintain bottom lines and profits.

Plastic People is a warning, it's a call to action. It's a demand that we do something, before it is too late, to protect future generations from microplastics. It starts with cutting back on buying plastics wherever you can. Don't use plastic bags at the grocery store, bring a reusable, non-plastic bag. Don't buy water in plastic bottles, get a reusable bottle and, if you don't trust the quality of your tap water, get a filtration system to assure that it's safe and clean as possible. After that, we have to call on politicians and corporations to change. It won't be easy, but if you have a child right now and you have grandchildren in the future, this is the only way you can be sure that they can be safe.

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