Educational Media Reviews Online

This film makes no excuses for being anti-surrogate. The surrogate mothers depicted tell their negative stories. The one young woman whose life was a product of a surrogacy explains that she never bonded with her adopted mother and when she met her birth mother, she understood why. Representatives from the National Organization of Women (NOW) complain of the commoditization of women and children.

This film definitely focuses on some aspects of surrogate motherhood that aren’t emphasized in the mainstream media. Reading about Baby M in New Jersey or other surrogate mothers refusing to honor surrogacy contracts may make someone think that surrogate birth mothers are unstable. However, there are other issues that were mentioned in the film: what if a test reveals birth defects, genetic diseases, or other imperfections? Who has the right to say whether the fetus should be aborted—the surrogate mother or the parents who have paid her to carry the child? Should the relationship continue with the surrogate once the child is borne? How is the child affected by being given away to another family?

One woman left her home in Texas to move closer to her brother and his partner in New Jersey so that she could bear children for them. But once there, they treated her poorly. After the children were born, she was only allowed to see them every other weekend—and then only through an act of the courts.

Clear parallels to Margaret Atwood’s 1985 dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale are implicit in this film—where the wealthy can afford a “breeder” to bear their children, while the women and children are treated like possessions to be bought and sold. As surrogate motherhood becomes more controversial in the United States, more impoverished Indian women are becoming surrogates to help feed their families. Yet, they are also considered somewhat expendable once the child is born.

Surrogacy can be a boon to infertile couples and to women who want to help them. Unless the viewer is aware of a positive surrogate relationship, then he or she will be left feeling that poor women’s bodies are being bought and sold as mere vessels to grow babies for the well-to-do. Because of the film’s anti-surrogacy bias, it leaves the viewer wanting to hear the positive side of surrogate motherhood.