MovieChat Forums > Tsunami: The Aftermath Discussion > 'Tsunami' is itself a disaster, and just...

'Tsunami' is itself a disaster, and just wrong

posted 17 years ago by zzbamzz
31 replies | jump to latest

http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/reviews/2006-12-07-tsunami_x.htm

By Robert Bianco, USA TODAY
The more important a story, the more important it is to tell it well.

Sad to say, the 2004 Asian tsunami disaster gets precisely the treatment we've come to expect from HBO's faltering film division. As usual, the two-part, two-week Tsunami, The Aftermath is expensively, impeccably produced, on location in Thailand. And as befits HBO's current affection for BBC co-productions, the movie is 100% Anglo-centric, from its point of view to its use of well-regarded if not always well-known British actors.

It is also absolutely and inexcusably tasteless, tone deaf and wrong-headed. And dull — the final disservice to the memory of the dead.

Some already have questioned the wisdom of trying to mine this tragedy for two weeks of entertainment when thousands of people have yet to find the bodies of their missing relatives. As it turns out, however, timing is hardly the film's worst flaw.

More than 227,000 people died in the tsunami, the vast majority of them Indonesian. Yet on whom does this Rudyard Kipling salute center? Two British tourist families, a British reporter, a British diplomat and a British aid worker. Oh, and a Thai boy who is rescued by one Brit and lectured to by another.

What's next from HBO and the BBC: a Katrina movie about a London couple on holiday?

Granted, we all wear blinders when it comes to our own. But to film on location in Asia and shove the native population into the background as extras is an act of cultural myopia, not to mention insensitivity, so severe as to border on the pathological.

The main tourists are two young parents (Chiwetel Ejiofor and Sophie Okonedo) separated from their child, and a woman (Gina McKee) separated from her husband and son. Of course their stories are sad, but the movie tells nothing about their suffering that you couldn't figure out just by reading that plot synopsis.

To be sure, every incident yields multiple stories, and if this is the one that writer Abi Morgan most wanted to tell, she has that right. Indeed, considering how inadequate and tinny her script is, we should probably be thankful she avoided the bigger picture.

Now do yourself a favor and avoid this one.

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I'm inclined to agree.

[–] tiffanykk2002 17 years ago

Great post. This movie is horrendously insensitive to the people of Indonesia. I hate that so many movies wind up focusing Eurocentric characters no matter what the tragedy may be.
The Thai male lead unfortunately looks like a good looking Hollywood version.
This movie would have worked better if perhaps shot documentary style with the disater affecting the island residents mainly, then perhaps a few of the tourists.
It plays like a melodrama, centered in the lives of one or two families and never really comes to terms with the devastation that occurs. Rather it winds up being some wild goose chase by the press and tourists.
The movie was obviously made only for the sake of making a movie about this tragedy. Terrible.

[–] dave-2907 17 years ago

I lived through this experience, and it is an excellent portrayal of all of the many events, emotions and conflicts that did occur in Thailand. Yes, many other places were effected, and my group mostly worked with Thai families seeking out their missing loved ones. But this story was very realistic, and I lived it.. so I challenge all others in their view points. By bringing this tradgety back to the lime light it makes us think about how we would react to such a disaster, and how are these local displaced Thai families coping now? Thank you HBO, BBC, and Kudo's films for this excellent work.

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[–] tiffanykk2002 17 years ago

I don't think anybody's doubting that this movie was created for money's sake. In fact, that's what makes it even more disgusting, thanks for pointing that out...

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[–] RobertaWa 17 years ago

I agree. This movie was so bad. I can't even count the ways. Toni Colette? Tim Roth? what a waste of talent. I won't watch part 2

Waste of time..

[–] Scruff79 17 years ago

I found it a very moving story. Yes, it focused on the tourists, but so did the emergency response at the time. That part of the world is reliant on tourism, and the film showed how the powers that be were determined to get the hotels back as soon as possible, removing people from the traditional villages.
I felt the second part reflected the suffering and loss of locals more than the imitial impact did.

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[–] dathaler 17 years ago

"...the powers that be were determined to get the hotels back as soon as possible, removing people from the traditional villages...."

I HOPE that's not all you got from it--that only the hotels and tourists are important.

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[–] Dreamscape 17 years ago

If it didn't have a storyline involving British, American, or whathaveyou characters, no one would have watched it and no story would have been told. To expect otherwise is to be quite naive. Yes, the story centered almost entirely on British characters. So what? It's not insensitive to try to tell a story that people will want to watch.

[–] rosie8675 17 years ago

ZZ, you're right that it's insensitive to have focused only on the British tourists, but sad to say, HBO got it accurate, because at least in the US, all we got filtered thriough the media at the time was the state of the British tourists, almost as if there were no Thais or Indonesians there. It sucks, but we live in a Westernized, Eurocentric world, so that's what the media will report on. I thought the focus that they did put on the Thais was pretty fair.

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[–] Dreamscape 17 years ago

Wow, so not the point of the two-parter, but hey, it's easier to make a random comment on a message board than a well-thought argument.

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[–] Dreamscape 17 years ago

Yeah, exactly. Or hell, how about how Pearl Harbor impacted tourists?

Truthfully, the story was told not to forget what the locals were going through. It was told to get you to watch at all. People cry out how insensitive it is to focus on British tourists/reporters, but these same people wouldn't have watched if the whole film was in a foreign language about the poor locals.

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[–] film_ho 17 years ago

The reason a movie is made doesn't always have to do with its ultimate quality. Perhaps it is too early for a film like this, and perhaps the focus on British nationals rather than the people living in the area bordering the Indian ocean is insensitive, but this is nevertheless an excellent film. It is not exploitive, is not a Hollywood disaster film, is in fact not about the tsunami at all, but as the title suggests, its aftermath. It represents a serious attempt to show how a disaster affects the people who are caught up in it.

The commercial exploitation of the disaster is, in fact, one of the film's main themes. News journalists are depicted as interested only in obtaining gruesome footage to sell to the cable networks and newspapers of the world. They are indifferent to the suffering they capture on film in their effort to satisfy they serve the rubbernecking public and their God-given right to see it all on television.

The filmakers are probably less to blame than the viewing public for the misguided focus on British tourists. Yet does anyone think this project would have made it to television if it was about the people who suffered in Sri Lanka, worthwhile as that story is? Would this BBC production have made it to the U.S.? It is a sad ugly truth that in America, at least, the bulk of the audience is interested in films about Americans.

One wonders if the USA Today critic even bothered to watch the film or was so offended by its premise that he made up his mind without seeing it.

Eenie meenie jelly beanie... the spirits are about to speak. - B. Moose

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[–] Dreamscape 17 years ago

Not liking the movie is an entirely different subject. We were talking about the ulterior motive of hating on the flick because it focused so heavily on European tourists/journalists/whathaveyou as opposed to focusing on those who lived there.

[–] eutherpeinlove 17 years ago

I'm a Thai and I just watched the series a couple of days ago. I think it did a good job in capturing the disastrous moments and I found myself in tears at some points. It's refreshing to hear the Thai photographer character - though played by a Chinese - criticizing the journalist for selling the cremation pictures to the press without understanding the underlying beliefs of such act. The scene when Than cremated his loved ones by himself sums it up and it shows how people (shall I say the locals and the Westerners?) deal with their losses differently.

Just some small points though, Than character doesn't speak Southern dialect, which is really weird when everyone else in his village speaks it. Toni's Thai pronunciation is almost incomprehensible, and it's a bit annoying when thinking that she plays an Aid worker who should speak fluent Thai, but I admire her for at least trying.

[–] luvkarate 17 years ago

Thanks for your comments. I too thought the miniseries was wonderfully done. All I got was the news here in NY and that did not touch on what really happened, and although this movie was fictionalized, it helped me to understand a bit more just some of what went on, even just a bit. By the way, the actor who played the Thai photographer is Korean-American. And having had to listen to "fake italian" being passed off as various italian dialects with which I am familiar... must have made you crazy to hear the inaccurate Thai accents being spoken! All in all I was very impressed by this miniseries.

[–] rodnet 17 years ago

This review is, while probably written from a politically correct viewpoint, complete and utter nonsense. It fails to take into account the main issue why the tsunami caused so much upset in the Europe and the US: the fact that we were involved.
Ever wondered why tragedies like earthquakes in Northern Turkey and Iran and the continuous wars in Africa get so much less attention? Think again. We in the so called 'civilized' world are really only interested in tragedies which shock our own existence. The fact that this movie focusses its attention on the British tourists illustrates this point and thus the movie provides an adequate report of how WE felt about the tsunami.
And, to be fair, I went to Sri Lanka this August, still saw a lot of aftermath of the tsunami, but even while hearing the stories and seeing the gruesome details I could not even begin to imagine the horror that overcame the local inhabitants on Boxing Day 2004.

[–] gaajar 17 years ago

I agree with many other posters and disagree with the reviewer. I am an Indian living in the US. I liked the movie. It made a huge impact on me. It made me care about this event. I know that Indians in India like to see Indian characters. Americans like to see Americans. I'm sure the same is true of the British. Its what the viewer can relate to. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. To cover the Indian, Sri Lankan and Thai viewpoints, I'm sure filmmakers there will make their own movies. And if those movies are well made, they may attract the commercial and critical attention of the Western public.