The Swimmers (2022)
Directed by Sally El Hosaini
Partly — The Swimmers is somewhat woke, scoring 54 out of 100 on our wokeness meter.
The Swimmers arrives with the full apparatus of the prestige biographical drama: real sisters playing real sisters, a sinking dinghy in the Aegean, a Refugee Olympic Team berth in Rio, and a Netflix release that topped the charts in fifteen countries.
Consciousness Markers
An Arab woman directs, two Arab leads anchor the film as real-life sisters, and refugees were deliberately cast in front of and behind the camera for authenticity—though the leads are Lebanese, not Syrian, a point the cast itself criticized.
The film is explicitly concerned with Arab identity, the refugee experience, and challenging reductivist Western framings of displaced people, placing Arab culture and dignity at its center.
The film centers two young women whose athletic ambition and physical courage drive the entire story, foregrounding female agency and sisterhood as the engine of survival and triumph.
Critics called it heavy-handed, and the filmmakers and subjects openly framed it as a consciousness-raising vehicle to 'raise awareness' for refugees—earnest messaging that edges toward sermonizing.
No LGBTQ+ characters or themes appear anywhere in the narrative.
No environmental or climate themes are present; the Aegean crossing is a matter of war and displacement, not ecology.
While smuggling and exploitation appear as plot mechanics, the film offers no economic critique or eat-the-rich thesis.
Despite heavy swimming imagery, the film makes no statement about body image or body acceptance.
No neurodivergent characters or themes are depicted.
It is a straightforward biographical account of true events rather than a re-framing or revision of established history.
Why it received this score
The Swimmers arrives with the full apparatus of the prestige biographical drama: real sisters playing real sisters, a sinking dinghy in the Aegean, a Refugee Olympic Team berth in Rio, and a Netflix release that topped the charts in fifteen countries. Sally El Hosaini directs with a steady hand and an eye for the physical ordeal of the crossing. The image of two young women in the water, pushing a failing boat toward Lesbos, carries genuine weight. The film does not need to argue for its own importance. It simply shows us the water.
On the question of who gets to tell this story, the production made a visible effort. An Arab woman directs. Arab leads anchor the frame. Refugees were recruited in front of and behind the camera, a decision the director framed as letting people participate in the telling of their own lives. That effort did not go uncontested. Manal Issa, one of the leads, later described the film as orientalist and apolitical, and observed that Syrians were largely absent from the principal cast. The distance between intention and result is its own quiet drama.
The engine of the film is two sisters and their stubborn refusal to drown, and the story is told with female ambition at its center. Arab identity and the dignity of the displaced sit at the front of the frame throughout. What the film cannot resist is its own sense of mission. Yusra Mardini has spoken of raising awareness and speaking for those without a voice, and the film carries that brief openly. Critics found it heavy-handed and too long. The sermon is sincere. It is also a sermon.
Analysis generated by our Consciousness Algorithm
Synopsis
From war-torn Syria to the 2016 Rio Olympics, two young sisters embark on a risky voyage, putting their hearts and their swimming skills to heroic use.
Questions about The Swimmers
Is The Swimmers woke?
Partly — The Swimmers is somewhat woke, scoring 54 out of 100 on our wokeness meter. That earns it a verdict of Woke-Adjacent.
What makes The Swimmers woke?
4 of the 10 markers register at 30 or above, led by Representation Casting (78), Racial Consciousness (65) and Feminist Agenda (50). On Representation Casting: An Arab woman directs, two Arab leads anchor the film as real-life sisters, and refugees were deliberately cast in front of and behind the camera for authenticity—though the leads are Lebanese, not Syrian, a point the cast itself criticized.
How does The Swimmers compare to other 2022 movies?
It ranks #24 of the 223 films from 2022 we've scored; their average is 22. The wokest is Bros (92).
How is the Woke Score calculated?
An AI-assisted process researches the film and its reception, scores it 0–100 on ten markers, then combines those into one 0–100 Woke Score. It measures a specific set of 2020s cultural themes, not film quality.