Sofia's Last Ambulance - EIFF 2013

We live, dear readers, here in the United Kingdom at a time when the most right wing government ever to hold office lords over us.

We are the plebs.

A slow erosion of our civil liberties and our public services that started stealthily under "New" Labour between 1997 and 2010 has now accelerated and led us to the point where education, health and the benefits system are on the brink of either full privatisation or complete destruction.

You may think that this doesn't really affect you.

You have your degree, you have a job, you enjoy good health, your family love and support you.

That can all be rendered meaningless or taken from you completely in the blink of an eye.

If you want to see what it would be like to live in a country where health services "enjoy" the sort of funding and care that this government craves then spend 76 minutes in the company of Dr Yordanov, Mila and Plamen as they tend to the sick of Sofia in their dilapidated ambulance.

By the films end you will be left feeling dismayed and grateful in equal measure.

Potholed roads, a criminal lack of equipment, a lack of proper funding, a demotivated workforce and people suffering injuries and disease that are, in large part, the result of social and economic inequality are all presented in a grimly realistic manner.  Each of the central characters are never anything less than completely convincing and utterly compelling.

A fine film and an important one.