Convergence: Courage in a Crisis

This is NOT about whether you agree or not with the covid19 measurements your government has taken so don't rate it based on that.

This is about people who stepped-up and helped those in need while risking their own life in times of much uncertainty where people got sick and hospitals got overran. This docu shows that there is still some humanity left in this f*****-up world. For that, I give it 8*.

CONVERGENCE is an incredibly ambitious and poignant film that presents a deeply moving mosaic of the global impact of (and response to) COVID-19. The access is incredible: where else can you see the pandemic play out so intimately in a dozen countries all over the world, including Iran, Peru, India, the favelas of Brazil, and Wuhan itself? The achievement of weaving all these stories together is amazing purely on a storytelling basis, as is the power of the various narratives of individual characters, especially the Syrian emigre in London, the ambulance driver in Rio, and the ICU doctor in Peru. The American doctor in Miami could be a feature all by himself. In the end, the film becomes about something much bigger than the pandemic (as if that's not big enough), but rather, the entire spectrum of injustice, oppression, and inequality worldwide, and our interconnectedness in trying to fight it. A staggeringly impressive and inspiring achievement.

There is a a lot to be said about writers and directors cramming far too many social issues into a 2 hour movie with so many individual people's stories trying to be captured in their entirety while trying to keep the audience interested and engaged in what is classified as a documentary film.

This movie attempted that and unfortunately it failed. A mini series may have worked in order to develop the characters' individual plights without jumping across numerous other characters' stories, countries, LGBTQI+, racism, politics, BLM, refugees, asylum seekers, illegal migrants, citizenship issues, recovered drug addicts, protests, activism ... the list is as long as my forearm. Way too many social topics presented in a rather amateur way for the screen. It's like a YouTuber made this mashup.

It was made even more tedious to watch with the contrived Syrian social media influencer banging his own drum for more exposure and likes whose constant crying was initially believable until he bragged and celebrated about his posts going viral. And another social media pro and driver in China also in it for exposure.

You missed a great opportunity to get this right, Netflix. But you messed it up.

When the whole world was cowering due to the fear of the pandemic and all that was visible was hopelessness, the makers of Netflix's Convergence still found a thread of hope which would show that everyone did find a reason to keep moving on! Kudos to the team which showed us the stark anguish around the world, but still found those real life reasons where hope was kept alive.

According to me, the most mind blowing a thought process was that in the midst of all the pain, illness and death, we had a child birth happening! If that is not the ultimate manifestation of hope, pray, what is???!!

My salute to the makers of Convergence who have actually shown the human spirit at it's most resilient!

I particularly loved it when Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the guy who concealed the pandemic for China at the beginning, is shown as the voice of reason. Huxley and Orwell would be proud. WHO definitely failed us and these people are trying to convince us they're actually the good guys. Absolute disgrace, the people who made this should be ashamed of themselves and the people who endorse and like this, should realize when they're being made fools.