Five Days at Memorial Review: Episode 1-3 Brutal Recreation Of One Of The Great Recent Human Tragedies

Stars: Vera Farmiga, Robert Pine, Michael Gaston

Director: Carlton Cuse, John Ridley

Streaming Platform: Apple Tv+

Filmyhype.com Ratings: 4/5 (four stars) [yasr_overall_rating size=”large”]

Five Days at Memorial, the Apple TV+ miniseries that adapts Five Days at Memorial by Pulitzer Prize winner Sheri Fink. Premiere of the first three episodes on August 12, 2022. Apple TV+ today premieres the first three episodes of the immersive series Five Days at Memorial that takes us to relive the harrowing passage of Hurricane Katrina through New Orleans and, specifically, how this crisis was experienced at Memorial Hospital, not only during the impact of the storm but after the break of the containment dams that protected the city.

This caused the streets to be flooded for weeks and a general panic to spread due to the lack of federal, state and local aid: devastation and disorganization were rampant, leaving aside the most vulnerable and needy people. If you have lived long enough to remember it, it will still make a great impression on you to remember that tragedy. Intramuros, inside a hospital complex crowded with patients and health personnel who we see how resources and hope are running out, is a very distressing viewing that also resonates with a great echo after the recent coronavirus crisis from which we are still coming out.

Five Days at Memorial Review: The Story

What can happen in just five days? This is what Five Days at Memorial are asking for, taken from Sheri Fink’s 2013 bestseller of the same name: the same year the rights were acquired by Scott Rudin who wanted to make a film with Eli Bush. But it is in 2017 that the project jumps to the attention of the media when it is spotted by Ryan Murphy, who had already changed his mind on the new anthological season of American Crime Story: it had to be the second and then the third season, recounting the non-compliance of the government in handling the unprecedented emergency of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. Murphy’s choice then falls on what is told in the book, focusing on Memorial Hospital, with Sarah Paulson called to play the controversial Dr. Anna Pou.

The project once again fails to take off and it is in 2019 that it is officially ordered by the nascent Apple TV+ as a limited series with Vera Farmiga in the main role and as co-showrunner none other than Carlton Cuse and John Ridley. The story focuses on the five days that followed the arrival of Hurricane Katrina and how the emergency was handled, with the few means and difficulties they had, by the staff, patients and families of the renowned and historic Memorial Hospital. A hospital that housed another inside, but whose two managements did not communicate well, and a building that did not have the suitable defenses for a natural disaster of this magnitude (but the whole city did not have them). Faced with all this, the temperature that was rising incessantly, the current that was going away and the water that continued to arrive inexorably, the doctors and nurses of the Memorial found themselves faced with an unmanageable situation but that certainly could have been dealt with better: all ‘ aid arrived after those five nightmare days, 45 corpses were found in the hospital chapel 45 for 5 days.

Five Days at Memorial can be perfectly divided into two parts: the first five episodes, which focused on the day-to-day life of the hospital, and the last three, which come to develop the consequences derived from what has been considered one of the greatest catastrophes that have ever been experienced. and by far the largest civil engineering disaster in US history. It is also a cry of rage in the sense that it very clearly denounces how little things have changed, unfortunately, and the manifest inability to improve the working conditions of health personnel. Not even the reconstruction of the dikes has been up to the task, given that it is very likely that in 2023 they will have to be repaired and/or reinforced.

The miniseries moves away from disaster movies to show the events not as a show but as a terrifying mousetrap that gradually transforms all the characters. It often uses real images that account for the torrent of water, the winds and the destruction caused by the forces of nature, but also the deterioration of facilities and people. In this sense, this first part could almost be considered a survival story… if it weren’t for the fact that de facto some gave up along the way. The lack of electricity supply, air conditioning in the middle of August and all kinds of resources: food, drinking water, and medicine gradually diminished the human teams completely overwhelmed by the situation.

Five Days at Memorial Review and Analysis

The great value of the series is not only to portray the events with great credibility but above all to delve into the human drama behind the triages and the dark decision to decide to end the lives of certain patients by practicing arbitrary and non-consensual active euthanasia. as a pious final measure. Many of the decisions that were made in such extreme circumstances have persecuted those responsible and the relatives affected by the loss of their loved ones for years, but they have also changed the rules of the game in some way, promoting regulations that protect physicians required by circumstances to decide and sowing even more uncertainty about their work ethic.

Along the way, other questions are addressed that also concern moral issues: from the relationship we have with animals, to the possession of firearms, the refusal of help or buried racism. Five Days at Memorial is a reflection on human nature, on the cracks in the system and the limits of tolerance for adversity, but also an example of resistance from a community to which the miniseries is dedicated… one of the most painfully essential of the recent television landscape.

However, it is the first three episodes that make ‘Five Days at Memorial’ one of the most humane and painful proposals of the moment. And although it is full of drama, this is a horror story with all the letters, the kind in which hope rises and falls constantly and in the cruelest way. That they hit you in the stomach and have no qualms about showing their worst images. What’s more, the miniseries has some of the most shocking sequences and several of the most harrowing shots that I remember on television.

And I wonder, why would anyone want to see such a proposal during the placid summer holidays? We talk about suffering, being outraged and looking away again and again. However, this is a worthwhile experience even though the direction is not always convincing. With an excellent cast, the miniseries is an unforgettable life lesson for -and for the good and the bad, but above all, it is a resounding wake-up call to the system, which resonates today after the questionable decisions regarding the pandemic. 17 years later we are still making the same mistakes. From bottom to top. Hopefully, we learn to learn once.

Five Days at Memorial Review: The Last Words

Five Days at Memorial many elements testify to how it was a story that had to be told: the crudeness of what happened, beautifully staged on a technical level, and the terrible alleged truth of what Dr. Anna accomplished. Pou at that juncture was wonderfully played by Vera Farmiga and the rest of the cast. Brutal recreation of one of the great recent human tragedies with exceptional production values ​​and an enormous resonance today.