Chernobyl Heart

I saw this film on HBO this morning and was profoundly affected by it. The helpless and abandon children so lonely and suffering brought me to tears. You want to touch them in some way to ease their pain. I, too, was moved to realize just how blessed I really am. It also frightened me when the filmmaker commented that Chernobyl is the next Chernobyl. That the structure is deteriorating and radio active material that remains within it will soon pose even a greater potential for disaster than the first deadly episode. Is there nothing that can be done to prevent this impending catastrophe? I would greatly appreciate any information that an expert might have regarding this extremely grave situation

I just saw this for the second time and it is a truly haunting film. Only about 45 minutes long, I have watched it on HBO once and then recorded it to show to my husband later. It filled me with such sadness and shock that I just had to share the experience. I had no idea that the effects of the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl in 1986 were so devastating and so long lasting. It seems to be that this whole situation and condition of this area is kept rather under wraps and silent. If everybody knew about these people and their lives now, I would hope more could and would be done to help. If you want to be informed, touched and moved very deeply, please watch this documentary.

It says a lot for the ignorance of mainstream film culture that this Academy Award Winning Doc Short has generated only three user comments on IMDb and zero external comments. Has anybody seen this film?

It is also bothersome in a way that the film is in HBO distribution because of the context of exploitative fare HBO deals in---all the sex documentaries Sheila Nevins puts out. And then this, sandwiched in-between.

The imagery is beyond exploitative; it so far over the line and yet obviously true. You could find these birth defects almost everywhere in the world but only in isolation. Here, they are in terrible concentration and the kids are suffering in terrible conditions in terrible state hospitals, mental wards and orphanages. All you Ronald Reagan boosting Americans who think 'freedom' won the day, 'won' the Cold War, look at what you have reduced Russia and its sister states to, just look at this and think what massive Lies you grew up under in the 1970's and 1980's and what they have brought about and become.

The next Chernobyl might be caused by internal terrorism in the US, but it will likely be, as the film says, Chernobyl itself. 97% of the radiation is still concentrated there, says the film.

If I seem angry it is from watching the film, the fallout, pardon the ugly metaphor, from the film. Why this is not a full-length film I do not understand. Why are their no officials interviewed, why is there no government response and responsibility? Why is no one from the UN interviewed? Why is the scope so small? Because the film telescopes to discuss the living conditions and medical defects only, it is 40 minutes of nothing but suffering and the small attempts to curtail it, to fix one problem, the 'Chernobyl Heart' defect that seems so tiny a victory in its symbolism.

It is one of the hardest and most necessary pieces of film I've ever watched. But the content is far too important to be compressed into such a painful frame, so stripped of context.

Think of how much the world could change if all the major TV networks in the world agreed to show this in prime time, simultaneously, without commercials.

When I was growing up in the hippiefied 70's, all the grade seven kids in my school were made to watch "Do You Love This Planet?". (Somehow, I don't think it was on the curriculum.) The most lasting, and sensible, propaganda experiment of my childhood. It stuck. There is no reason for this film not be similarly shown.

The Chernobyl reactor itself is seen briefly, and from a distance, to give you an idea of what this documentary is about. Some senior citizens living in the area are interviewed, and the rest of the time is spent in orphanages and hospitals in nearby Belarus, as radiation seems to take the greatest toll on growing or developing bodies. In line with another HBO documentary I've seen, Hacking Democracy, Chernobyl Heart does not have the production values of a HBO television series.

If you are easily disturbed by seeing deformities from radiation then it might be better to give this a miss, but even so it shows the disaster that has befallen Belarus (of which Chernobyl borders), which does not have enough funding of its healthcare system to handle all the victims. "Chernobyl Heart" is the name for a hole in the heart condition and the crew visit an American surgeon who repairs this condition with a $300 heart valve patch which Belarus can only afford a limited number of.

Chernobyl Heart is a reflection of the growing dis-ease spreading like a cancer around planet earth....we think that because we don't know about the acute suffering of children,and others, thousands of miles away, or are not aware of the severe poisoning of a portion of Mother Earth's body, that it does not directly affect us. But like any cancer that begins to grow in our body, we are usually not aware of it's presence until it reaches a certain critical point...then we begin to FEEL it directly and can no longer deny its existence. What will it take for us to collectively wake up from our self-absorbed coma that refuses to understand anything at all until it's too late. We can donate our money or time in helping victims of disasters, and this is always needed, but why is this never enough? Have we not noticed that throwing money at calamitous situations never seems to solve the systemic problem of greed and corruption in the consciousness of MEN basically in charge of running everything on this planet? Maybe we all need to awaken our OWN Chernobyl Heart, first............before it is too late.