My Sister's Keeper

I’m the kind of girl who can be moved to tears watching a 30-second TV commercial. Little kids, old people. The sick, the dying… a malnourished puppy – just add music – my throat gets tight and my chest heaves. I cry.

So l knew that going to see My Sister’s Keeper with my Mumma was going to get me sobbing – I just didn’t realise the effect if would have on my persistent blocked nose. Luckily said-Mumma had a bag full of tissues and needless to say I can now breathe freely; two weeks with a snuffed up schnoz sorted during the course of a 109-minute flick.

But seriously, have you seen this film? It’s fabulous.

Happily married couple, Sara and Brian, have the perfect family life until they find out their two-year-old daughter has leukaemia. In order to save the life of one child they bring another into the world – a perfect donor match in the form of Anna. And so begins more than a decade of blood and bone marrow donations from sister to sister, constant hospital stays and ultimately the dissolving of Sara and Brian’s happy family dynamic. When Anna calls on the services of a top defence lawyer, to seek medical emancipation, a messy and traumatic reality becomes even more tragic.

Yes the subject matter is horrible and sad and full of life’s-not-fair moments, but the actors are all incredibly well cast – Cameron Diaz is amazing as the fiercely single-minded mother, Sara, and Sofia Vassilieva gives a vivid portrayal of the dying girl, Kate – and both sides of the coin/dilemma are explored, developed and ultimately given credence. You can’t hate Sara for the choices she’s made and you can’t fault her children for their actions.

In my life I’ve known parents with sick children, and friends who’ve lost siblings – I can’t possibly begin to imagine their grief. The tears I shed for one small film are nothing compared to the convulsions I would have were I to lose a sister or any member of my family. Family is everything to me and I hope one day to have children of my own – but the scary thing is that the more people who are important to you the more you have to lose.

But I suppose it’s what you have that keeps you going and what you had that keeps memories alive.

In the film’s final sequence, Anna says it best, “What’s important is that I had a sister. And she was fantastic.”