The release of a series or movie addressing the Coronavirus pandemic was inevitable, and now it is here. Totally under Control premiered on 13th October 2020 and a lot of people tuned in to watch the movie because of a simple fact; we all went through it, and we all can relate to it.
Totally under Control: What’s up with the title?
It is often said that we should not judge a book by its cover, but let’s be honest, we do it. We do make interpretations in our mind after reading the title and watching the trailer. The title is a satirical comment on the situation and the handling of Coronavirus by the Trump administration. When the comparison started to occur between the spread of the virus in the US and South Korea, both countries recorded their first case on the same day. Yet the number of deaths in South Korea is in the hundreds while deaths in the USA have exceeded 200,000. When people were suffering, Donal Trump said in his speeches that everything is totally under Control, and this virus will go away on its own! So, the title is very catchy, now let’s talk about the content.
The gist of the documentary
The documentary tracks the early stage of spread and how the administration tackled it. We get to see and hear from the experts who saw this coming and tried to contain it, but the doctors, laboratory directors, and the researchers didn’t get much help from the authorities to win this fight. All these people were given orders to stop the destruction, but the tools provided to do that were negligible. One hundred twenty minutes of film documents how scientists regularly alarmed the government, but the authorities didn’t do anything. You will see how the Trump administration ignored the pandemic guide prepared by the Obama-era officials and totally ignored the already done damage. A doctor stated that many people have died because of mismanagement; however, we see that this didn’t take place because of mismanagement but because there was no willingness and attempt to manage it in the first place.
It documents the suffering of people. Totally Under Control features a maker of N95 masks who were forced by the feds to prepare the masks quickly. It demonstrates how science was used for political gain, how they plan to blame the states was executed. Most important, we see that in the Trump presidency, personal fealty is more considered more important than professional experience; it doesn’t matter how many die.
Totally Under Control: Performance
Alex Gibney’s Totally Under Control was hurriedly put together due to the circumstances. Still, it didn’t affect the performance much as the documentary successfully represents the essential details of an up to the minute investigation. Scott Becker, Taison Bell, Michael Bowen, Beth Cameron, and others made the documentary fascinating. The bright and precise assessment of the administration’s multiple failures is refreshing and frightening at the same time!
Our Take:
Totally Under Control tells an unforgettable and unfortunate story of a deadly virus unleashed upon humanity and the failure and lack of will of the Trump administration to contain it. You will feel the fear and sorrow of people coughing their guts out in the hospital wards while the president is uttering that it’s a miracle, and it will disappear on its own. We cannot deny the fact that it tells us things we already know about what was going on in American, but sometimes it gets too much to take. Totally Under Control is just the beginning; we are going to have many more movies and series in this genre. It would be best if you watched it; it’s like a real horror movie. It will give you a feel of Contagion 2; only it’s real!
Totally Under Control: Where to watch?
You can watch it on Hulu, iTunes, and FandangoNow. It is not available on Netflix as of now, but we expect that Netflix will spend some dollars to make it available for the users.
