Apologies to The Thirteenth Year. Or Swimfan. Or whoever’s working on a Michael Phelps biopic. But I don’t need to see another movie about swimmers. The Swimmers is already the best one, culled from a real life heroic tale of two incredible sisters. Apologies to Michael Phelps, but you ain’t got sh*t compared to the incredible Madrini sisters.
Sara (Manal Issa) and Yusra (Nathalie Issa) Madrini are the daugthers of Ezzat (Ali Suliman) and Mervat Madrini (Kinda Alloush). By 2012, The Madrini family of 5 (they have a younger sister Shahed) live comfortable lives in the Damascus suburbs, with Ezzat pushing his daughters to become Olympic swimmers for Syria by the 2016 Olympics. However, fate intervenes in the form of the Syrian Civil War, which upends their whole lives. Desperate with nowhere else to go, Ezzat and Mervat push Sara and Yusra to leave Syria and seek asylum in Germany, the most welcoming of the European countries to refugees. Accompanied by their cousin Nizar (Ahmed Malek) and a few thousand Euros, the sisters begin their migration from Damascus to Hannover Germany, which, um, isn’t exactly the simple task it initially seems like it is going to be.
Director Sally El Hosaini layers in the dread the minute we see “Suburbs of Damascus, 2012.” What seems like a relatively normal life for Sara and Yusra gets more scary, little by little. Daily routines are replaced by militant ones like constant passport checks; more frequent friends and people the Madrini sisters knew end up deceased. By 2015 when they’re ready to depart, there’s constant threat of bombs or gunfire near their home. Those early scenes also set up the sisterly dynamic between Sara and Yusra, with Sara the directionless rebel and Yusra the devoted favorite child. By the time the girls depart Syria, we feel like we know them, and we’re going to be in for strange but kinda fun road trip with two sisters after their initial stop in Turkey.
But that’s simply, tragically, not the case. The Swimmers take on a whole new meaning when it comes to trying to migrate across the Aegean Sea. The true meat of the story transforms what swimming actually means to the Madrini sisters as their journey enters another new layer of Dante’s circle of hell. El Hosaini’s script transforms into less a sports tale and more a story about refugees and their plight just to find a home. We meet some of the 18 or so other refugees in the Madrini sisters cohort, and learn some of their personal stories about where they came from and where they’re going. The feats of strength and emotional courage of these people is given a well deserved showcase in The Swimmers: a relentless onslaught of impossible obstacles that these amazing people overcome again and again. The relatively fortunate Yusra and Sara use the Olympics as their goal. Why? Because it’s not about the Olympics anymore. It’s about the basic right of any person to have dreams, and have one good chance to achieve them. It’s also a motivator for Sara, who finds her purpose in her plight: to fight for the helpless. Yes, The Swimmers has a sports moment, but by the time Sara and Yusra Madrini get it, they’ve already won the real competition, which brought me to the highest of highs after dealing with the lowest of lows like any great story should.
Cruelly, Sara’s story takes a dark turn. She’s been arrested on some drummed up charges by the Greek government as a political ploy. The “criminal” organization Sara Madrini worked for? The Emergency Response Centre International. Sounds pretty evil to me. I’ve donated some money to various refugee causes in the past. The Swimmers moved me so that I will probably donate some more again, because incredible people like Yusra and Sara Madrini deserve a shot at their dreams and all the help they can get because of their unfortunate circumstances.