So in 1999 a movie was made of the book Fight Club. The
premise of the movie (according to IMBD.com) is that “An insomniac office
worker looking for a way to change his life crosses paths with a devil-may-care
soap maker and they form an underground fight club that evolves into something
much, much more...”
The soapmaking part is an intriguing social and economic
statement about modern life. The premise is that they steal fat that has been liposuctioned
from people, turn it into soap, and then sell it back to those same rich people
through high end retail Macy’s –like stores. Essentially people pay to get rid
of their fat, and then pay again to obtain it again. I personally like the
macabre, almost Sweeney Todd-like references (and now that I think of it Helena
Bonham Carter is in both movies). And if that isn’t enough the glycerin they siphon
off of the soapmaking process is also used to build bombs.
So although this movie came out almost 15 yrs ago, I will
have one person (usually a guy) ask me if I have ever seen the movie. I say yes
and then explain this (in a shorter more compact way than I am explaining it
now)…
According to the American Council on Exercise the average
obese woman is 32% body fat, however the human body needs about 12% fat for daily
living, so let us just assume that 20% of the overall weight could even be
extracted.
Thus, if you are a middle aged woman who weighs 200 lbs,
40lbs is fat. Now the fat needs to be
rendered to remove it’s water before it is made into soap.
According to Dr. Jeffrey Utz, Neuroscience, pediatrics,
Allegheny University, different people have different percentages of their
bodies made up of water. In adult women, fat makes up more of the body than
men, so they have about 55% of their bodies made of water.
So 40 lbs of fat minus 55% water = 18 lbs of rendered fat to
make soap with. Assuming a 6 oz bar of soap, that leaves you with just 48 bars
from the average human obese woman who has had ALL of her excess fat extracted through
liposuction. And if I remember the movie correctly, the bags they steal
certainly don’t seem very heavy or numerous for that matter.
Seems like a lot of work for a soapmaker so professional they can sell to the big box stores!
And for the bomb thing? According to soapmaker Kailer
Westerman: In the simplest terms: you make soap out of fats and lye. The fats
already contain glycerin as part of their chemical makeup (both animal and
vegetable fats contain from 7% - 13% glycerine). When the fats and lye
interact, soap is formed, and the glycerin is left out as a "byproduct".
But, while it's chemically separate, it's still blended into the soap mix. While
a cold process soapmaker would simply pour into the molds at this stage, a
commercial soapmaker will add salt. The salt causes the soap to curdle and
float to the top. After skimming off the soap, they are left with glycerin. They
then separate the glycerin out by distilling it. (if you are keeping up with
the math this is about 2 lbs of glycerin for every 40 lbs of fat they started
with.
Now glycerine itself is very stable and even good for you, nitroglycerine
is commonly produced by treating glycerol with white fuming nitric acid under conditions
appropriate to the formation of the nitric acid ester. It is dangerously
sensitive and dropping or bumping a container may cause it to explode. This is
the bombs are made of. This isn’t explained in the movie at all from what I
recall and they use quite a few large
barrels of this stuff.
I am pretty good with chemistry, and this is waaaaayy beyond
me. So this is my personal myth busting
of the movie. I haven’t read the book, it may explain more, but the movie was
too violent for me the first time and I have been told the book is worse, so I
will skip it.
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