Mardini sisters on Time’s 100 Most Influential People 2023

Syrian sisters Sara and Yusra Mardini were listed on the Time’s 100 Most Influential People of 2023, as the sisters inspired Netflix’s popular drama The Swimmers.

The Mardini sisters attended the Time 100 Gala 2023 in New York City last week, which hosted all the awardees and other big names in the entertainments industry.

“We are honoured to be part of this incredible group,” the Mardini sisters wrote on Instagram after the Gala.

The Swimmers is a “a dramatisation of a true story of two sisters who fled their home and endured a harrowing journey before rebuilding their lives and, for one of them, making it to the Olympics,” according to Reuters.

The movie premiered at the 47th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), with a premiere in the MENA region at the 44th Cairo International Film Festival last November.

Two-time Oscar winning actress Cate Blanchett praised the sisters by saying “in 2015, sisters and competitive swimmers Yusra and Sara Mardini fled Syria because of conflict. During the dangerous sea crossing from Turkey to Greece, their dinghy’s engine failed.”

Blanchett added “the sisters were among those who jumped into the water to guide the overcrowded boat to safety, saving the lives of all on board.”

She also said that the sisters’ story has “brought the human reality of what it means to be displaced to a mass audience. That story continues as both Yusra and Sara fiercely advocate for everyone’s right to seek safety. Whoever. Wherever. Whenever,”