The Power of Two

“Triumphant” may be an overused blurb, but it well suits director Marc Smolowitz's documentary inspired by the titular memoir by Ana and Isa Stenzel, twins who were born in Los Angeles in 1972 with cystic fibrosis—a seeming death sentence of progressive lung failure. The sisters were so often in and out of hospitals that they wrote and illustrated their first book, a manual for CF patients, when they were adolescents. Aged 19 when the gene that causes CF was discovered, their only hope for long-term survival was the revolutionary double-lung transplant operation pioneered at Stanford University. Having both undergone the procedure (twice, in Ana's case), the “Miracle Twins” are now both advocates for and companions to fellow CF sufferers, as well as passionate proponents for organ donation. Sadly, cultural norms and taboos have made organ donations (and hence transplants) distressingly rare in the twins' ancestral Japan, and the pair here visit Tokyo to try to change long-held notions about illness, death, and radical surgery. The narratives of their individual fights for life are transfixing, while the emotional side of transplantation (including relationships with the families of the deceased donors) adds powerful drama to this engrossing documentary. Highly recommended. [Note: this is also available with public performance rights for $150 for public libraries and $350 for colleges and universities from Collective Eye Films, www.collectiveeye.org.] Aud: C, P. (C. Cassady)