Delayed Reaction: Last Men in Aleppo

The Pitch: I don't think people fully understand what the White Helmets do.

A documentary about men in Aleppo who rescue people from recently bombed buildings.

I guess this is what I get for trying. I decided to get a jump on the Oscar nomination announcements and watch one of the inevitable nominees beforehand*. So, I watched this documentary about men in Syria who put themselves in constant danger, made by the filmmaker who gets incredibly close to the action. Sadly, that movie was City of Ghosts, which didn't get nominated. Instead, it was Firas Fayyad's Last Men in Aleppo that was nominated. Sure, this isn't The Highlander. There can be more than one. I don't think it's hard to understand why it's hard for two documentaries about similar topics to get nominated though.

*This is where I include my occasional reminder that I work off a backlog of these Delayed Reactions. I write them in real-time, but in order to ensure I can post something nearly every day, I stay well ahead of posting. When needed, use context clues to rebuild my timeline.

And I get why Last Men in Aleppo won over City of Ghosts in that head to head. City of Ghosts is a much harder movie to watch. The violence is much more sinister and there's a feeling that we're following the story somewhat after the fact. Last Men in Aleppo is immediate. The leads of that movie are heroic on camera in an easy to understand way. They are pulling people from collapsed buildings. Even though that leads to some unsettling footage as well, it's somehow more digestible than watching the filmed executions featured in City of Ghosts. There is something instantly harrowing about literally watching as a bombing happens a few blocks over. Oscar nominations shouldn't be won for putting yourself in the most danger, but on a gut level, I'm fine if that happens.

Beyond the fact that I couldn't believe some of the footage that Fayyad got, I wasn't a huge fan of the movie. It struck me as more of a collection of crazy footage rather than a story. I'm not sure I needed a full feature of this. Perhaps that means I'd prefer last year's Oscar Documentary Short winner, The White Helmets. Last Men in Aleppo is fine. I just felt like it spent a lot of time underlining the same point rather than making new ones or expanding on the larger point.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend