This movies is about the 2004 Tsunami that killed something crazy like 200, 000 people. This film takes place in Thailand because well, that is the most recognizable place in all the spots that people died in. Not nearly as many people died in Thailand as in say, Indonesia, but it is far more reasonable that a family would be vacationing in Khao Lak than Banda Aceh.

one of the things that makes this story great is that it is based on actual events of an actual family that was actually vacationing here when the Tsunami actually happened. I know that is a lot of "actuals" but it is important if we are going to tell a "real" story that some of these factors exist.

A lot of the special effects were exaggerated for the sake of cinema, such as the shot above. I was here when the tsunami hit and well, it was more like a river just came out of nowhere and all of a sudden existed everywhere rather than a massive wave that shot over the top of buildings.

That didn't make it any less devastating though. Water weighs nearly 7 pounds a gallon and if you are all of a sudden hit with hundreds of thousands of gallons of it... well it doesn't really matter if it is airborne or not, you are going to lose that battle every time.

People who were lucky enough to not be drowned or bashed with flying debris had to face another horrible situation afterwards- which was being separated from the people they know and horribly injured.... and this is the story of "The Impossible" which i think is a rather good film.

This movie was close to being banned in Thailand because well, they are sensitive about those sorts of things, and even after it was finally allowed it did not do well in theaters. I once played it in the display room of my guesthouse that I owned and the police came by and asked me to switch it off. They were not forcing me to do so, which was nice, but i complied because i didn't want to offend anyone.

One of the things that I really enjoyed about this film was the way in which the compassion of Thai elders (particularly country folks) was displayed in this movie. I know old people that live on farms, i know how to speak with them and I can say without any reservation that if they saw someone in pain, it wouldn't matter who they were or where they were from, they would be looked after exactly as is presented in this film.

Bottom line: This movie takes some liberties as far as science is concerned but as far as the aftermath is concerned and portrayal of Thai medical services, this movie is about as accurate as you are going to get.