Saturday, November 16, 2019

Sitting In The Aisle: The Cave



The Cave WHOA/10

I can't give this a normal rating like I do with other films. I went to AFI Fest with Coco again. We do this every year and I told her “We are gonna see some sad ass movies...” Well, we saw The Cave which was very sad but had some humor in it and I genuinely loved seeing the way the hospital staff worked together. Some scenes reminded me of when I would get trapped in the emergency room when I worked at the hospital and there would be shouting, bleeding, and everyone needed to be a well oiled machine to save lives. Except I have never in my life had to worry about a jet dropping bombs on where I was working. Holy shit, the bombs in this documentary.


The focuses on a doctor named Amani Ballor who is working in Ghouta during the Syrian Civil War. I admit that I have hear dof it but know nothing about it except that it is happening and that wrestler Sami Zayn runs a charity to help there as he is of Syrian decent. That's pretty much it. But after watching this I will be taking a deep dive into learning the history of this. This is hard to watch at times as she specializes in children and there is a lot of images of children in various stages of pain and death. Every time a jet flew by people would wait to hear the explosions that got progressively closer. An explosion would be heard and then moments later more injured people were being brought in, many of them kids. Food was getting low. Medical supplies were getting low. Space was getting low. It was like...fuck!


Along with all the bullshit this hospital that is located underground through a series of caverns and caves they have to deal with of all things sexism! At one point a husband who wants his wife to get medicine that can not be retrieved demands to speak to a male doctor and says that a woman can not and should not be in charge. I was like “Dude...come on.” She gets messages from her father and he sends videos telling Dr. Amani that she should come home to her family and take care of her plants. It ends with her not knowing what she wants to do after finally being forced to leave after a chemical attack. The way this was filmed it makes it feel like you are invisible in the hospital and actually suffering with these people which sucks. Not that the documentary sucks. It is informative and so hardcore that if a film was made with this premise and the situations that occurred you'd say they were overdoing it. Except this is real and happening right now.

I can't do a review for American Factory because a fire alarm went off forty minutes in.

Click here to donate to SAMS Foundation.

"The Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS) Foundation is a US-based, non-political, non-religious, medical relief organization that provides millions of Syrians with urgent and life-saving medical services. SAMS Foundation is a U.S. registered 501 (c) (3) charity. All donations are tax-deductible to the fullest extent of the law."

Click here for previous Sitting In The Aisle.

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