★ 7 / 10
Pretty good, although I suspect a bit one-sided
siderite
I am a sucker for medical outbreak stories and this one is one of the biggest in recent times. The film describes the quarantine of the ship Diamond Princess…
I am a sucker for medical outbreak stories and this one is one of the biggest in recent times. The film describes the quarantine of the ship Diamond Princess in Yokohama from the standpoint of DMAT, the "disaster medical assistance team" and the people who handled the situation on board, even if at the moment it was not their direct responsibility. The movie was made with the support of DMAT and the fact that some of the important events were omitted makes me question a little bit how objective the movie can be.That being said, the movie was good! A bit too long, but it covered so much of what happened, too. Long story short, DMAT are heroes, as is the young government official helping them and in the end the cute reporter who misrepresented the facts in the beginning. No mention of the American political interference and the separate flights to fly out only the Americans on board, no mention of the American writer who criticized the quarantine conditions, but then got their due when they were fenced in by their own government's quarantine and not a lot of medical detail.Basically, the film says that DMAT did what they could with what they had and with the best of intentions and I really believe that after watching the movie. Remember they weren't even fully trained for this, they were medical logistics people.An interesting reason to watch this kind of stories is that they dispel the myth of the communal culture superiority in case of emergencies. Yes, people in these cultures will be very motivated to sacrifice themselves for the good of the group, but the caveat is what they define as their group. Politicians, media outlets, individual people, they all can just not care about anyone relevant if they define their group as their family at home, the political clique they belong to or the "media" as something that has to break eggs even if they don't feel like eating omelet. And that's what happens here. DMAT succeeds not because of their great Japanese nation, but almost despite it.Particularly spooky were the digital doxing and virtual lynching of people who were determined by their community to be involved with Princess Diamond. Exposed publicly, they were refused work, child and health care and even basic services - and that included family members of medical professionals trying to solve the problem.I am not advocating for rampant individualism here, I am just saying that it is a particular case of group oriented thinking when the group contains only one person. The problems don't magically disappears when you increase the sizes of the group.Back to the film, the acting and directing were reasonable, many scenes were too "fat" and needing trimming and I suspect a positive bias towards the Japanese organizations involved, but I liked it and if you enjoy these kind of stories, if you take it with a grain of salt and some soy sauce, Frontline is good.
Read full review
★ 7 / 10
siderite
I am a sucker for medical outbreak stories and this one is one of the biggest in recent times. The film describes the quarantine of the ship Diamond Princess…
I am a sucker for medical outbreak stories and this one is one of the biggest in recent times. The film describes the quarantine of the ship Diamond Princess in Yokohama from the standpoint of DMAT, the "disaster medical assistance team" and the people who handled the situation on board, even if at the moment it was not their direct responsibility. The movie was made with the support of DMAT and the fact that some of the important events were omitted makes me question a little bit how objective the movie can be.That being said, the movie was good! A bit too long, but it covered so much of what happened, too. Long story short, DMAT are heroes, as is the young government official helping them and in the end the cute reporter who misrepresented the facts in the beginning. No mention of the American political interference and the separate flights to fly out only the Americans on board, no mention of the American writer who criticized the quarantine conditions, but then got their due when they were fenced in by their own government's quarantine and not a lot of medical detail.Basically, the film says that DMAT did what they could with what they had and with the best of intentions and I really believe that after watching the movie. Remember they weren't even fully trained for this, they were medical logistics people.An interesting reason to watch this kind of stories is that they dispel the myth of the communal culture superiority in case of emergencies. Yes, people in these cultures will be very motivated to sacrifice themselves for the good of the group, but the caveat is what they define as their group. Politicians, media outlets, individual people, they all can just not care about anyone relevant if they define their group as their family at home, the political clique they belong to or the "media" as something that has to break eggs even if they don't feel like eating omelet. And that's what happens here. DMAT succeeds not because of their great Japanese nation, but almost despite it.Particularly spooky were the digital doxing and virtual lynching of people who were determined by their community to be involved with Princess Diamond. Exposed publicly, they were refused work, child and health care and even basic services - and that included family members of medical professionals trying to solve the problem.I am not advocating for rampant individualism here, I am just saying that it is a particular case of group oriented thinking when the group contains only one person. The problems don't magically disappears when you increase the sizes of the group.Back to the film, the acting and directing were reasonable, many scenes were too "fat" and needing trimming and I suspect a positive bias towards the Japanese organizations involved, but I liked it and if you enjoy these kind of stories, if you take it with a grain of salt and some soy sauce, Frontline is good.
Read full review
80%
AUDIENCE
6.3/10
291
•••
Good movie. But slow compared to "The Flu"