Under the Wire review: Marie Colvin documentary is both gripping and moving

Chris Martin tells the story of journalist Marie Colvin’s final assignment before she was killed by the Assad regime

Geoffrey McNab
Thursday 06 September 2018 11:33 EDT
Comments
War photographer Paul Conroy, pictured here with Marie Colvin, has said he hopes a new documentary, Under the Wire, which captures the death of journalist Colvin, injects a sense of shame into the Syrian regime
War photographer Paul Conroy, pictured here with Marie Colvin, has said he hopes a new documentary, Under the Wire, which captures the death of journalist Colvin, injects a sense of shame into the Syrian regime (PA)

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

Sunday Times foreign correspondent Marie Colvin died in Syria in 2012. Chris Martin’s gripping and moving feature documentary tells the story of Colvin’s final assignment. She and photographer Paul Conroy entered the country illegally, smuggling themselves in through a storm drain and making their way to Baba Amr in Homs.

The film is based on a book written by Conroy, who is the main interviewee. He was with Colvin in the international media centre at the time the Assad regime killed Colvin. Wounded in the same incident, he was determined to survive and to give a full account of what happened in Homs as civilian areas were bombed by the Syrian army.

“These beautiful people who were being slaughtered, I wanted to tell their story,” Conroy says, not just of Colvin and French photojournalist Rémi Ochlik also killed, but of the many Syrians who died.

Director Martin has some extraordinarily rich material to draw on – Conroy’s memories, those of colleagues at the Sunday Times and of other journalists who also travelled to Syria, Conroy’s own photographs, and first hand video footage of the siege.

The film is chilling but inspiring. We get an impression of Colvin’s dogged approach to her journalism – her tenacity, her ruthlessness when it came to protecting her patch and her compassion for her subjects. Other journalists would desert the Syrians under siege or see their plight as simply as a way they could make money. Colvin, who had lost an eye while reporting on conflict in Sri Lanka a decade before, earned their trust. She refused to leave.

Conroy’s survival story is astonishing itself. After Colvin’s death, he had a hair raising encounter with the Syrian Red Crescent, an aid agency run by the Syrian government. He was warned not to get into one of the organisation’s ambulances. Had he done so, he might have been executed.

Colvin’s life has now been dramatised in A Private War, a new dramatic feature starring Rosamund Pike and set to be released by the end of the year. It will struggle to match up to the tension and drama found in Martin’s documentary.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in