Amazing story of an unimaginable impossible real life disaster

Rating: 9/10 (5 January 2013)

I left the cinema feeling very emotionally drained after this film but it was totally worth it. Only after viewing it will you understand the true meaning of why the film is called the impossible!
I viewed this film with open mind and not really knowing what to expect and straight away I was gripped by it! Its filmed so well that you cant help but feel as though you are right there living through this awful experience with the family. Everyone involved did an amazing job of making sure the audience were en-captured and could almost feel what the characters were feeling. I say almost as as much as I tried to feel it I doubt you could ever know how scary heartbreaking and terrifying it must have been to live through it but the film made sure I felt it enough to thank my lucky stars I have never had to and hopefully never will!
The tsunami hits very early on in the film which I wasn't expecting but nothing more of the before shots were needed, its simple, it was Christmas, they were a loving family in paradise in a brand new hotel on the beach front with lots of other people doing exactly the same thing. None of who could have possibly imagined what would unfold without any warning! The build up was quick and thats how it would have been, one minute your reading a book or in the pool and the next hell arrives on earth.
The rest of the film needs to be seen and not explained but its a very well told story of this families journey. It leaves you stomach and heart in your mouth the whole time as everything unfolds.
In some parts its gory and you do see dead bodies, some may say this is 'too much' but it isn't, that was how it was there so thats the story that should be told. It was devastating but real. Very real. This is not a feel good film and even though the families story is amazingly impossible, there is no good ending to this as for every amazing survival story there is a heartbreaking notion that roughly 230, 000 lost their lives.
The main focus was on this families story which was exactly the right thing to do but I believe it shows enough of glimpses of other peoples stories and horrific images to show how tragic it really was out there.
I came away thinking of this amazing family but also of all those who had a very different story to tell. As I feel at the end when they are leaving the devastation to return it was brilliantly captured that although they all survived and more thankful for this than they could put into words, their faces also showed their lives would never be the same again, this would live with them forever.
I watch lots of films, I enjoy lots of different genres but I can honestly say no film has ever made me feel the way this film did both at the time and still a day later as I write this.
That in itself proves this is a must-see film. It feels real. It was real and you will not forget it.