TV REVIEWS : A Candid Look at Cancer Fight in ‘Ali’

Three months after her 12-year-old cousin Ali was diagnosed with liver cancer, Lisa Ling showed up at the family’s Massachusetts home with a camera operator. The result is “Ali,” one of four documentaries with cancer themes airing Sunday afternoon on KCET-TV Channel 28.

Ling is an unusually polished USC senior and anchor-reporter for Channel One, an informational TV service beamed to public schools, and her discipline and professionalism in this documentary are notable, given its nature and her relative youth.

Remarkably candid and free of false sentiment, her 23-minute film shows how Ali and her parents cope with the basketball-sized tumor attached to the diminutive girl’s liver. They cope rather well, it seems, as Ali is able to laugh about losing all of her hair as a result of chemotherapy, for example, and her mother half-seriously tells Ling: “You can be maid of honor at her wedding.” The honesty in front of the camera is impressive.

At one point, Ali animatedly resists having painful surgery to remove what remains of the tumor post chemo. She ultimately relents, though, and the operation is a success, signifying an apparent rosy ending to her story. But stay tuned.

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“Ali” airs Sunday at 2:30 p.m. on KCET-TV Channel 28.