Inspiring, somewhat episodic, and definitely a crowd-pleaser.

Yusra Mardini’s story is one worth telling through film – and this does a solid job of that.

Directed by Sally El Hosaini (My Brother the Devil), The Swimmers combines two of cinema’s most inspirational genres — the sports movie and the survival drama — into a single moving film.

The effect is emotionally gripping (the film does provoke tears), but the inner lives and anguish, the ongoing sorrow at losing a homeland, are somehow overlooked.