The weeks surrounding World Aids Day will have an added focus on AIDS awareness with the Pay-Per-View and VOD release of “We Were Here” from Red Flag Releasing.
According to the press release, “We Were Here” is about “the extraordinary, true story of the first response to HIV and AIDS through the eyes of five witnesses”:
“In the early 1980s, HIV and AIDS ravaged San Francisco’s gay community with impossible ferocity. The words of five men and women who lived through it, accompanied by extraordinary photography and archival film and video images, come together to create ‘We Were Here’– a spare, unblinking look at the way an ostracized community responded to seemingly impossible tragedy.
The HIV/AIDS crisis galvanized the gay community in San Francisco, which had been simultaneously famed and reviled for its celebrated sexual freedom. When official response to the epidemic appeared to be non-existent, gay men, lesbian women and straight San Franciscans alike found common ground on which to unite.
What has come to be known as the “San Francisco Model” of response –emulated by cities around the globe – was born from a desperate desire of people affected by the illness, both directly and indirectly, to take action and find ways to help. In ‘We Were Here,’ they recollect how their lives changed in unimaginable ways, and director David Weissman incorporates archival news footage, personal photos and videotape to depict their hopelessness and determination as they realized a formal, official response was not forthcoming.
Marginalized and seemingly ignored, they offered solace to each other and took remarkable measures to formulate their own response, which included forming hospices, AIDS charities, and showing enormous compassion at a time when many in the mainstream populace advocated quarantine and shunning of people afflicted with the virus.”
Also, the film has been regarded as one of the best-rated films of the year by audiences as well as movie critics; case in point–The New York Times has stated that the film “is above all a film about love. … The humility, wisdom and cumulative sorrow expressed lend the film a glow of spirituality and infuse it with grace,” and The Memphis Commercial Appeal stated the film as being “artful, compelling and moving,” noting that “it reminds us that people sometimes really do pull together and help each other in times of crisis.”
The film will be available December 9, which coincides with World Aids Day, December 1. To learn more about the film, check out the official site for “We Were Here.”
