Five Days at Memorial is a tough, gritty, and urgent drama that offers no tidy conclusions as it attempts to unpick themes of accountability and the lingering injustice that continues to haunt the United States of America.
Sometimes, real life is far more horrific than anything a fiction writer can conjure. John Ridley and Carlton Cuse’s adaptation of Sheri Fink’s detailed and harrowing book, Five Days at Memorial, places us in the middle of an event so gut-wrenchingly awful that it is hard to believe we are witnessing it in one of the wealthiest countries in the world in 2005.
Starring Vera Farmiga, Cherry Jones, Cornelius Smith Jr. and Robert Pine, this is the story of the New Orleans Memorial Medical Center during Hurricane Katrina. But this tale is less about the hurricane and more about government failure, the collapse of civil structures, and the unbearable decisions doctors and nurses were forced to make as they sat alone in a hospital, surrounded by floodwaters. It’s the story of 45 patients who died over five days and a fragmented healthcare system that allowed a hospital to be isolated in its time of need.
Five Days at Memorial is a tough, gritty, and urgent drama that offers no tidy conclusions as it attempts to unpick themes of accountability and the lingering injustice that continues to haunt the United States of America.
Five Days at Memorial is now streaming on Apple TV+.
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