...This is my hospital, my church. Do you, Felix Turner, take Ned Weeks—
FELIX. Alexander.
EMMA. ...to be your...
FELIX. My lover. My lover. I do.
NED. I do.
(Felix
is dead. Emma, who has been holding Felix's hand and monitoring his
pulse, places his hand on his body. She leaves. The two orderlies enter
and push the hospital bed, though all the accumulated mess, off stage.)
NED. He always wanted me to take him to your new house in the country. Just the four of us.
BEN. Ned, I'm sorry. For Felix...and for other things.
NED.
Why didn't I fight harder! Why didn't I picket the White House all by
myself if nobody would come. Or go on a hunger strike. I forgot to tell
him something. Felix, when they invited me to Gay Week at Yale, they had
a dance...In my old college dining hall, just across the campus from
that tiny freshman room where I wanted to kill myself because I thought I
was the only gay man in the world—they had a dance, Felix, there were
six hundred young men and women there. Smart, exceptional young men and
women. Thank you, Felix.
(After a moment, Ben crosses to Ned, and somehow they manage to kiss and embrace and hold on to each other.)
Tom, get on your plane right now
I know your part'll go fine.
Fly down to Mexico
Da-n-da-da-n-da-n-da-da and here I am.
The only living boy in New York. (Paul Simon, "The Only Living Boy in New York)
The
quote above is from the end of the play (obviously). The film, being a
film, ends with showing the Gay Week dance at Yale. It's a powerful
ending, I think. No words, but a slowly gliding camera moving through
the couples to Ned alone and crying, all set to Simon and Garfunkel's "The Only Living Boy In New York."Are his tears at this end his thank you to Felix? I tend to think so.
When
the play was first performed, as the movie makes clear in the
statistics printed at its end, money was not forthcoming from the
Federal government. President Reagan would not say the word "AIDS"
publicly until 1987 (though this is disputed by some). Whether or not the President said or didn't say the word, the point is that Larry Kramer
was watching his friends and community die in front of his eyes. He,
and the play, were in the middle of a catastrophic epidemic. The movie
version makes clear that the casualties were far from over, hence the
last card that Tommy puts in his drawer is that of Bruce. Watching this in
1985 must have been like watching CNN breaking news. Today it's history
and much has changed and become significantly better. But even then
Kramer wasn't merely reporting; he was also crafting a popular drama, he
was making art that, if it succeeded, would last beyond the tragedy of
its time, in much the same way that Do The Right Thing
still resonates, even since the creation of Black Lives Matter,
and long after the racial incidents that inspired Spike Lee to make it.
Something similar can be said for Wit: in all its specificity of
illness and time and behavior (I believe the play and/or the film has
been used to train doctors), Vivian Bearing is always with us. We know
that teacher; we know that woman; we know that human being. And we all
will know in some way, shape, or form, what awaits her.
So:
1. Your reaction to the film now you've seen it all (and it would have been better to watch it all in one sitting, I agree).
2. Today as we started talking about the film, Stuart said something about the "happy" ending—that there is the solace of Ned and Ben reconciling (but as as Moey said, this would not have happened without the intervention of Felix) to temper all the tragedy the film presents. So what kind of ending is it? Hopeful? Hopeless? Something else? Stick to what we see and know from the
film—don't extrapolate from what we know will happen in the future.
Imagine this is it—Ned at the dance is the end.
3. We
know the film is about the AIDS epidemic. But is that all? If this play
can exist as art, as something more than a "These events are inspired by
real events, but the names have been changed (besides Mayor Koch's),"
then what is this play/film about? What does it leave us to talk about,
make us talk about, beyond or outside the outrage we feel about wasn't
done to help the gay community? In the way that Wit was about cancer, but at the end we weren't talking about cancer, and DTRT was about race, but by the end we weren't talking only about race, what is this about? And what would you want to talk about in the next day or two about it?
Give
these questions some time to bubble and then set inside you. Don't
answer them in 10 minutes. A
couple hundred words. See you guys tomorrow.
And remember: your paper is due next Wednesday (or Friday—but that's your choice). Don't wait until the last minute to write it. We'll talk on Monday about quoting and other mechanics. My baseline with seminar papers: it would be a paper you would feel comfortable turning in to a college professor (maybe Vivian Bearing). So maybe talk with me about it tomorrow.
Here's a video of Larry Kramer reflecting on the film and his play.
See you all tomorrow.
1. This movie touched me deeply. I think that it strikes a good balance between being a love story and teaching its audience about AIDS. I feel deeply for Ned and Felix and Bruce and all the characters who died and lost loved ones. I am also angry (now that I have stopped crying). I can’t help wondering what would have happened if the government had paid attention, if the CDC and Emma and all the doctors who knew something was wrong had gotten funding and had discovered a treatment earlier. Maybe the death count wouldn’t be over 36 million. I think that this movie is so powerful because it allows us—forces us—to sympathize with the characters, to understand the sadness of their situation.
ReplyDelete2. I don’t think that I can call the ending happy. It is an ending: the ending of a life, the ending of a love story, the ending of Ned’s time on the board of the Gay Men’s Health Crisis. But it feels unresolved, like a song ending with a dissonant chord. It is beyond melancholy, even without knowing that so many more people will die of AIDS and that it will take so long for the government to do anything. I think that the only thing we as an audience can do is hope, hope that Ned keeps fighting for research and help for the gay community, hope that something gets done, hope that others don’t have to go through what Ned had to go through. I agree that Ned is off-putting, but I am still very much rooting for him. So I don’t think we can call it a happy ending but we can call it a hopeful ending—there will always be hope coupled with sadness and because it is a movie and not our lives we can find the hope and grab onto it readily.
3. I think that this film is about love, love in all its owner and power and danger. AIDS is a disease transmitted by love. The characters in the movie are oppressed because of who they love. This movie is about gay rights, about rights for any oppressed group that is refused medical help when needed. People did not react to AIDS in the same say they reacted to Toxic Shock Syndrome or the 7 Tylenol cases because the people who were getting infected in the US were gay and the heterosexual people who were infected were African. Our government is dominated by straight, rich, white men. If the disease were primarily in straight white men then the government would have shoveled millions of dollars toward CDC and NIH. They would have cared, as evidenced in the movie by the man Ned encounters at the White House who didn’t care one bit about AIDS once he decided that he couldn’t get it by sleeping with his female hookers. This movie is about oppression—racism and homophobia and xenophobia and hate for anyone who doesn’t fit into a neat little box. It asks important questions about our values as a society; I would like to discuss these questions in class.
1. I liked the film. It definitely grabs a viewer's attention because it immediately shows some pretty intense sexual images, and it contains a lot of screaming and crying. It is dramatic, but that makes it effective at holding your attention. The main characters were well developed. In some ways, Ned is unlikeable, but the movie does a good job of making you sympathize with him anyway. I feel like the film also presents the perspective of his less zealous fellow activists at least somewhat well. The movie doesn't seem to condone their actions, but it at least gives background and justification for why they are not fighting as hard as Ned, which makes the movie less one sided.
ReplyDelete2. It felt like a hopeless ending to me. Ned really did best. His whole life he had been struggling with being gay and being oppressed. Then, when this health crisis emerges, he tries as hard as he possibly can to help. Meanwhile, he finally meets a partner, something he has wanted for a long time. Throughout all of these new experiences, Ned stayed true to himself. He always acts the same way, he pushes hard, he fights, he doesn't give up, he speaks his mind, and he thinks critically. However, it never seems to be enough. His friends turn against him, nobody listens to him, and people criticize his methods. He then loses his spot in the group that he created, and he loses Felix (not to mention many of his other friends). By the end of the film, Ned has lost so much that can never be regained. Even if the government finally does decide to do something (which we never see in the movie), Ned now knows how the government is. Before this, Ned knew that many members of society and the government didn't do anything to help oppressed gay men and lesbian women, he knew that they didn't really care about that community, but now he sees more clearly. After his experiences, he must see the country's disdain for his community by the way that they choose to ignore the crisis. I feel like his life can never be the same with that knowledge.
3. I think this movie/play says something about the mentality of society. Few are comfortable breaking out of the normal mold that society places them in. Even openly gay men (who were already breaking out of the societal norm by being gay) were afraid to be like Ned and go further to fight for their own cause. Other people in positions of power were afraid to do anything to help because of how society might view them. They were so constrained by the ways others would perceive them that they couldn't have the greater vision to see that they were allowing thousands of people to die. Ned mentions that NY Times put news about Hitler's idea to eradicate Jews in the back of the newspaper. This is another instance in history where we see people are afraid and constrained by the perspective of those around them. And their fears may be founded, they could lose their jobs, lives, or connections by speaking out. This play seems to bring up the conflict of a person's own individual voice and the larger voice of the society around them.
1. I know I've already said this, but I loved this movie. I think its documentary-like portrayal contrasting with its sentimental love story impacted me in ways I hadn't expected it to. I remember being sad, angry, and laughing all at the same time. I also liked being able to connect with the main character, which was a different experience from what we read in Wit. I think I was more aware of my ability to relate with Ned than I would've been before because of how disconnected to Vivian I was. And saying disconnected is kinda reaching because to some extent she was a very funny and human character, but with Ned he was very open with his emotions and shared them quite readily which I think made my experience watching this movie a lot different. This movie also instilled a lot of rage within me with the government for so easily ignoring the fact that so many people were dying and denying the fact that this was in fact an epidemic.
ReplyDelete2. I felt very helpless in the end, as if nothing would get better. I especially felt this way seeing Ned sitting alone at the dance, and then again further into the ending when we see the card thingies (I'm sorry I don't remember what they're called) of Bruce and a couple other characters being put in the drawer with the cards of the other dead people they lost to HIV. While it was great to see Ned and his brother make up, for me it didn't necessarily hint at any sort of hopefulness in the future, because death brings people together all the time and I didn't really think about this too much as being promising or positive. I was actually thinking about how I totally thought the next scene after seeing Ned watching the couples dancing together was going to be Ned killing himself. The ending was just very morbid and sad and it seemed like everyone was either going to die from the virus or kill themselves because there was no hope of finding a solution, or even getting people to fund the research of the virus.
3. I think this movie is about how society looks at the gay community and also how we should respond to situations to make change happen. I think that at the beginning the movie was more so about what the right approach to finding funding for research of the virus was, but as we gradually progressed through the movie and learned that they weren't going to get funding it felt more like the movie was about how people look at homosexual people and how degrading and cruel the public was treating them. We're presented with Ned's approach which is harsh and loud, but is also very honest and gains attention. Then we see Bruce's approach which is to suppress the truth and to cater to the needs of the public to some extent and we - for me at least - try to decipher which method makes the most sense. Later as we learn the government is not on their side, it becomes so hopeless that it's more about how we're going to continue to live in a world where this is the way the government protects and cares for us.
ReplyDelete1. I enjoyed this film greatly, though it moved me to tears several times (and I hate crying during movies). I think the best attribute of the film is that it is so thematically rich and layered. It isn’t just about AIDS or just about love or just about politics; it’s about all of these things and more, which makes it impossible to pigeonhole. I think that watching it in one sitting would have enabled us to better appreciate the disparity between the opening scenes of paradise and frolicking and the final scenes of death and devastation, but it was meaningful nonetheless. I didn’t find Ned alienating or annoying at all. In fact, he was the character I felt most attached to, and not just because he was the protagonist. I feel like, if i were in that impossible situation, I would’ve snapped way more than ned did. I might have actually killed someone in frustration, like the mayor’s representative or the guy who turned down Emma’s research proposal.
2. Ned and Ben’s reconciliation certainly adds a happy element to the film, but not enough to compensate for the overwhelming tragedy. That being said, the closing scene at the Yale Gay Week dance added a sense of hope to the film. All these gay and lesbian men and women are shown dancing and loving openly, which would have been inconceivable just twenty years earlier. However, it’s also true that this new era of sexual liberation in the gay community is what made these men so susceptible to this pathogen in the first place. I’m not saying that I think the gay rights movement shouldn’t have happened or that gay people should be held responsible for this epidemic, just that we have to acknowledge this tragic consequence of the liberation movement.
3. I think this movie is ultimately about the role of a community during a crisis. I’d like to talk specifically about the response of gay leaders and activists to this disease, a sickness that comes with such stigma and fear associated with it. I mean, here was this new, fledging community of gay men who were finally able to love openly, but who were then struck by a sexually transmitted plague. How do you respond to that, as a gay leader? Like many of the men said, they couldn’t just tell everyone to stop having sex, since they viewed sex as the cornerstone of their political movement. I was struck by what Mickey says during his breakdown, that he’s fought his whole life to destigmatize gay sex, only to find out now that he might have been in some way “responsible” for this epidemic. I mean, there’s no way he could have seen this coming, but he still feels such an enormous burden of guilt. I’d like to address that in class tomorrow.
1. I loved this movie and it did a great job of talking about the early HIV/AIDS infections through a more human rather than a more scientific lens. More importantly it made me angry and not many –if any– films have had that affect on me. For a film to evoke such a strong emotion from me makes me respect it more because it means that it was not only entertaining but that it was also able to comment on human nature in times of great tragedy.
ReplyDelete2. I can't see this as a happy ending, to me, it's a hopeless ending. Maybe it's because I'm still angry about the story of the film, but I don't know how Ned could possibly feel a sense of closure match less happiness. In the end I don't think it matters whether or not Ned's brother finally accepted him as his equal or if he understood Ned's pain. Nothing changed except for the fact that Felix died and on top of that, Ned was removed from the GMH. He went from fighting for a whole demographic and the love of his life to losing both. I'll admit that the last scene was beautiful, but it wasn't bitter sweet –as most scenes like that usually are–. I don't think seeing Yale with hundreds of openly gay students –compared to when he was a student there without any openly gay students– means as much now that he is back in that same mindset of feeling alone. Proudly and openly gay or not, Ned has come full circle to having to fight all alone for being who he is.
3. I think that the film is about how people can watch others die and not care because of pure prejudice. It's about the helplessness people like Ned –and to some extent, the GMH board– feel when no one will bat an eye no matter what they do or how load they yell. I think this film as well as Do The Right Thing comments on the fact that people don't see a problem that doesn’t affect them or a problem that affects people they discriminate against as something that is also their responsibility. It's outrageous to me that a person can stand by and do nothing while another person is dying or being treated as less than human. I guess from this I'd like to discuss how society treats the problems of one group that is discriminated against. Do their problems not matter? Or is it that society sees their (meaning any minority group, but mainly gay men in this case) downfall as a good thing?
3. The theme that struck me the most would have to be the idea of there being a place for blame in death. What does one do when handed their death sentence? Blame the government? God? The one who gave it to you? Does one even have time to be angry when they’re dying? I think they must. It’s like those seven stages of grief, only what you’re grieving is your own demise. They start with denial: too young and in love to die. Then they proceed with the guilt: being gay did this to me; why couldn’t I be normal? Third comes anger and blame: why did this happen to me; it’s not fair; who did this to me? Finally comes reflection. This reflection is something rather unsettling because it’s these young men, boys, accepting that their twenty some years are all they’re going to get. They must accept their death before the inevitable occurs: they die. The last two stages (hope and reconstruction) are left only for the loved ones they leave behind. That’s actually another really interesting question this movie poses: how does someone deal with their loved one dying? How does someone deal with the loss of the person they love after they’ve died? They, too, experience these stages, but as we can see with Ned, anger can last much longer in them than in their dying counterpart. But what else is there to do besides be angry and fight. I’m hitting the keys on my laptop really hard now because all this death makes me angry too. I want to fight with Ned, to punch that useless, glorified secretary to the president and the one to the governor. Actually, as Asiya said, basically everyone who isn’t Ned. It was as though all of them had already accepted death, which could be healthy if they themselves were dying, but they aren’t; they are living, breathing, walking, talking, so why can’t they fight too? They’re blaming Ned for his loud desperation, and Ned blames them for their silent stoicism. There is a time and a place for stoicism, and yes, when staring down death it has purpose, but these men, they aren’t facing death the way the dying are, and in some ways, what they’re doing is harder: living through all this loss and heartbreak. That said, they’re as good as dead when all they’re doing is accepting a fate that has yet to be their own. They are willing their own death to come with their silence.
ReplyDelete2. Yes, I would say this ending is hopeful. These couples, gay and lesbian, are young and healthy. They’re the people Ned has saved. He couldn’t save Felix or the others, but he could give the chance at a long, healthy, loving life to all those who are to come after Felix, after Ned himself, after all of them. This Yale Gay Week slow dance is the future of the gay community. It’s not simple promiscuity, nor is it disease and death; it’s a life lived however they choose to live it. They get choice and youth and love and fun and joy, and all because of Ned. So yes, I’d say this is a happy ending to a bitter movie.
1. I’m glad to have seen it, but it was really hard for me to watch. I ugly-cried for the entire second half of the movie, but I think that, to some extent, that was the point. We were meant to be overwhelmed by the death and hopelessness of it all; we were meant to feel their love and their heartbreak, their joy and their grief. Ned and Felix’s relationship is built up just to then tear us down and strip us bare. That was a big part of it to me, feeling exposed. Crying at school is not something I enjoy, but this film left me no choice. Just as Ned had no choice in the matter of falling for Felix, he had no choice in the agony of slowly losing him too, and neither did we. We grew attached to these characters without being necessarily conscious of it, so when they die, it hits us all the more because we weren’t expecting to feel such loss.
I believe that Larry Kramer has captured the feeling of chaos. The slow, inevitable, and inexplicable death of many of one's friends and one's lover would surely bring anybody to the brink. But while Ned's character- an outraging, cynical, haranguing, pent-up, discounted younger brother- certainly endures unbearable agony in this situation, he also seems to thrive in this world of death and despair. This combination of character and scene results in a calamitous, discombobulating, and suspenseful movie throughout. Every time Ned's friends wish to address the epidemic tactfully and graciously, Ned steps in with either an inflammatory pamphlet, a proposition to protest, or even screams. Ned's reactions to personal matters are often violent, such as when he throws a table at Felix after Felix stated that he was going to die. This results in a experience similar to listening to “The Shape of Jazz to Come” by Ornette Coleman(one of the pioneers of Free Jazz)- a grating on the ears that you can't get enough of. The movie feels complete at the end, but there is no resolution, much like how Ornette Coleman can't resolve any of his licks. Our only solace is that Ned has finally reconciled with his brother.
ReplyDeleteThis irresolute ending is intentional- Ned/Larry calls us to action through the movie. But maybe this is in order to show a redeeming quality of Ned: if he cannot be heard in his own time, he can be heard in later times.
If you want to listen to another album that captures the feeling of chaos, I would suggest “The Empty Foxhole,” also by Ornette Coleman.
I will stand by my previous statement that the movie ending is happy, despite the continuing threat from AIDs. When Felix comes to seek help from Ned's brother, Ned's brother realizes that their love for each other is not a perversion- evidenced somewhat subtly when he suddenly learns how to hug Ned to express his sympathy, when he promises to stand by Felix's wishes, and when he watches Ned and Felix's pseudo-marriage in the hospital. But the reconciliation between Ned and his brother is not the only thing that is happy in this ending. The pseudo-marriage and the Yale dance both send a message about love amidst such tragedy- not only can it live, it can thrive.
Maybe this is how Larry Kramer chooses to respond to those resistant to abstinence- showing that love between two men can exist outside of sex, and that the message of love is just as strong.
I think that this play is about coping with relationships- friendly, romantic, and sexual- during times of incredible hardship. The disease put enormous burdens on all the characters- both Bruce and Ned had to take care of their lovers and had to grapple with their sexual identities in some way. Emma had to watch nearly all, if not all, her patients die while she struggled to find a cure. Ned alienates nearly all his friends in his quest to save Felix. Ned has to reforge his relationship with his brother. In this perspective, AIDs is no longer the focus of the movie- its a plot device to put the relationships into the wringer, and explore the human capacity for connection when the humans in question are under extreme stress.
1. The main feeling the movie left me with was a deep sadness. It felt like the rest of my day was clouded because I started the day off with this film (which wasn’t necessarily bad). I thought it was a very powerful movie overall, what with the honesty with which the difficulties of the sickness was shown. The entire movie was rather difficult for me to watch – watching the sickness overtake these men in addition to the fact that they were so torn as to how to address this issue was very painful. This dilemma – how to fight the disease - was very intriguing for me, something I’d never once thought of or considered when thinking about the AIDS crisis, or watching other movies that touch on the epidemic. One thing I liked about the film was that I did not feel detached from the characters. They felt like real people I would form opinions about if I potentially interacted with them.
ReplyDelete2. I wouldn’t say the film’s ending was happy. I think there were finer, smaller details of happiness in an overall depressing conclusion, such as Ned and Felix’s emotional marriage/deathbed scene and Ned and Ben patching things up. And it seemed that Ned did ‘accept’ Felix’s death (somehow overcoming his initial and prolonging denial). I think one signifier for my reaction to the ending was how I felt at the movie’s end – almost hollow and very saddened. I think it’s accurate to say I felt unsatisfied by the movie’s ending. While I didn’t love Ned’s behavior throughout the movie, I wish there was something more uplifting for him at the end of the movie than getting kicked out of this organization and getting shunned by all of his friends, all the members of the community he has fought to preserve. I feel like he deserves more happiness (considering how much he has been through), even if I didn’t necessarily agree with his methods for fighting for this happiness. I think the movie is hopeful in that it could push people to want to make changes in the world. At the same time I wasn’t filled with this lighter sense of hopefulness at the movie’s conclusion. We did not see the ‘fight’ against AIDS ending well for these men, and many of the smaller love stories within the movie also ended sadly. I’m definitely a sucker for happy endings and I wish this movie had a little more of that.
3. I agree with Nell that this movie is about love. I think it is also about oppression and discrimination, fighting for what you believe in, and trying to execute this in the best possible way while still staying true to yourself (obviously not an easy feat). I think many of the characters are very layered, especially Ned, and I think he is the character the audience becomes most familiar with. The movie is about relationships with others – romantic, familial, friendships. Things people who are not suffering from disease are struggling to figure out as well. Honestly, I’m very interested in hearing what other people have to think about the dilemma that we touched on a bit in class today – whether Ned should have been more ‘diplomatic’ in his efforts and behavior or if he was acting correctly. I also want to discuss how this ties into the gay community’s dilemma of having sex and expressing their freedom vs. saving their lives. I also just want to talk more about Ned in general – I think that he is a very deep character and a complicated person and that he almost divides audiences. I’d like to talk about how he treats the people in his life.
1. Heart rending and impacting, most likely not something I would have watched on my own time, yet a remarkable film. The story was historical information interspersed with periodic emotional smacks upside the head - every time they formed an organization they had an argument about it, scientific evaluations were pulling at my heart strings, and legislation and lack thereof made me cry. The raw feelings in this film were more than I’m used to because of the drive behind them. People were dying, and no one was helping - the dead, these loved ones, were being taken out of hospitals in garbage bags, and the grieving were charged for the ashes. Insult to injury upon injury. Every happy moment originated from or was followed by more bad news - a woman approaches the newly forming organization wanting to help, but wanting to help because her friend is dead. Ned and Felix finally find a person they want to be with forever, and then Felix is diagnosed. Maybe the most drastic example is the marriage, in which they are wed and literally moments afterwards Felix passes away. The lack of action was above and beyond infuriating. I was so angry that this was being ignored. I can’t say I /enjoyed/ watching the film, because most of what it did was deeply upset me, but I am /glad/ I watched it. It’s hard to understand the extent of historical events without having them upset you.
ReplyDelete2. The end of the movie is difficult to describe. It shows a deeply happy moment - the dance - in the wake of an awful tragedy - Felix’s death, and the aid epidemic as a whole. It is happiness while you’re still grieving. What stood out most significantly for me about that moment was that the room in which the dance was held was where Ned tried to kill himself. The room in which a gay man tried to kill himself for being gay, because he thought he was the only one in the world, is now filled with a school-sponsored even for gay people to celebrate themselves and be with who they love. Yet, Ned is here as well, mourning. It definitely shows a positive trend, but when juxtaposed with the awful, horrific, and tragic events that permeated the first 90% of the film, it’s difficult to end the movie on a high note.
ReplyDelete3. The film is about two of the most basic things a person needs - love, and survival - and what happens when they’re taken away. The Normal Heart starts out showing a community of people loving each other, and learning to love and accept themselves. People so long denied what straight people had thrown at them were just recently finding ways to find love. Ned, who grew up thinking he was broken, then learned better only to come to the conclusion that he’d be alone anyway, finds Felix. They are happy, and they are healing, and they are safe. Then, a disease. Everyone’s dying and no one knows why - even worse, no one seems to care. Petitions and cries for help, requests for sponsorship or funding for research, or even just some publicity, are ignored. They’re dying and the government and their society are letting them die, while simultaneously blaming it on who and how they love. Death and loneliness are now the reality. They initially respond to this in various ways, but boil down to the same reaction. Ned rages, screaming insults and throwing accusations, even throwing things at Felix while he sits on the floor muttering about how he’s going to die. Ned is trying to fight something, but he can’t find the right pressure point, so he kicks and screams and nothing happens. Emma is trying to learn and educate, and go about this logically and systematically. She is hunting for funding and research, trying to figure out what to fight before fighting it, but when funding is outright denied she hits a dead end, and logic crumbles in the face of emotion. Emma screams, throwing papers and insults, behaving remarkably like Ned. Bruce is taking a charismatic approach - he appeals, and negotiates, and waits patiently while he’s ignored, but once again he proves that cornered people turn violent. Bruce attacks Ned even while a camera roles. Everyone is terrified, and everyone is trying to fight for their love and their life, but they simply can’t do it alone, and it’s tragic. So I think it leaves us with the question: when threatened with incredible loss, what do you do?
I loved the movie - I thought it was a perfect blend of sentiment and activism. However, it left me deeply frustrated. I wanted a resolution to the epidemic, yet everything any character tried seemed to be stymied. Doing nothing? You'll get AIDS. Acting diplomatically? Good luck penetrating bureaucracy, corruption, and societal norms. Acting out? You'll end up alienating those around you, and have less than you had when you started. Furthermore, even if they had ended up convincing someone to help them, the science was so unclear they wouldn't have even known what to say! And even if they got the science right, should they have really been focusing on the government? What if your personal life and helping your loved ones is more important than the larger battle? It was an impossible situation that the protagonists were thrust into, and it felt intensely frustrating to watch them battle something you know they can't win. Besides resolving the epidemic, additionally there was no sense of closure on Ned. Yes, there was a hint of a reconciliation with his brother but I was unsure of how Felix's death affected him. It's safe to assume that he would have been terribly heartbroken, but I wanted to see him reevaluate his choices - as in, maybe I should have spent more time thinking about the ones I love and care about instead of an impossible war against a government that will never listen. Even though what if the mayor had caved? You see, it's impossible. In this way, I think The Normal Heart is much like Do the Right Thing. They both present impossible ethical quandaries but nevertheless ask how to deal with them.
ReplyDeleteI feel like The Normal Heart does two things at once - first, it highlights how we don't care about a problem unless it's going to affect us. The woman who comes and helps at the hotline doesn't care until her friend dies, Ned doesn't care until he sees the young man die, the straight men in government never care because none of them are dying. It almost paints humanity as complacent and selfish at the same time, except for the fact that when people do start to care they will devote their lives to a cause. That wholehearted motivation is, I think, a redeeming quality. But its more than just about how to solve a problem. Like Wit, The Normal Heart also questions our values - should we value life over love? Does it matter if Ned's alive if he's cold and lonely? And, should we value our loved ones lives over the lives of a hundred thousand unnamed people? Does it matter if Ned's trying to save a bunch of people if he alienates his friends and people he loves? Does it matter that Ned's being an *asshole* if he has high goals? I think its vital that we dissect these quandaries to understand Kramer's message more fully.
note: all three of the questions kind of blended into one because of the way I answered question one - I hope that's ok, I can go back and separate if I have to
Delete1. It’s interesting that movies that are about such painful things can be so good. It was hard for me to watch so much pain play out on a screen, but I definitely would not have liked this movie as much as I did if there had been less of it. Surprisingly, the character I found myself most drawn to was Tommy because he was a follower, and I identify as a follower too. He was in an interesting position, where he had to decide whether to side with his friend Ned or do what everyone else thought was best for the group, and these are the kind of situations where followers can have really important roles. Even more so than in Do The Right Thing, this movie made me feel like there was no right way to fight against a society and a government that was content with watching you die. This is a little dark of me, but I feel like the only way society or the government can be pushed to act is if the fatalities of the AIDS epidemic reach such a level that the numbers are impossible to ignore.
ReplyDelete2. I think the ending is hopeless. The main reason I say this is the frequent shots of Tommy taking out his friends/acquaintances cards and rubber banding them to an ever-growing stack. By the end of the movie, Tommy has made a second stack of cards. It is a constant reminder that this disease is getting worse and will continue getting worse. Yes the scene with Ned and his brother reconciling could be seen as hopeful but I think it is too little too late. It took Ned’s dying boyfriend to jolt his brother out of his non acceptance of Ned’s sexuality. There cannot be much hope in the world if so many people have to die to bring about change. Finally the scene with Ned at the dance. Ned is so alone. Obviously he is without Felix, but he has also been removed as head of his organization which points to the strife that could be slowing down the whole process even more.
3. I think the movie is very much about how a majority responds to the plight of an oppressed minority. There were some references to the holocaust in this movie, about how the news that the Jews and other minorities were being killed in Europe was way at the back of all the major papers. It appears that by the 1980s, the majority hasn’t learned its lesson and that history is repeating itself. This movie shows how the majority’s views on the issue are extremely powerful, manifesting themselves even in the actions of the oppressed. For example, Micky has a personal crisis when he thinks about how much he has worked for the government but hasn’t helped advance his organization's cause. I understand why Micky didn’t try to put AIDS in the spotlight because he needed his job, but I think another important idea this movie deals with is finding the right balance between self sacrifice and achieving the goal. Ned was frustrated that many of his friends did not want to come out and thought that was holding back the organization and maybe he was right. Yet how much is a reasonable amount of self sacrifice to expect from someone? I don’t really know.
1) I feel worse now that the movie has ended than during it. Whenever I watch a movie that has that impact on me, I usually stay silent for a while. It almost feels as if talking is disrespectful to what I just witnessed, making our discussion after difficult for me. The only other movie I can't think (off the top of my head) that had this impact on me was Grave of the Fireflies. I don't do well with death. The number of dead don't affect me. One death can have just as much of an impact on me as the thousands of deaths from AIDS at the time. It's the story of the people dying, the idea of the death, that really gets to me.
ReplyDelete2) This isn't a happy ending. The word I'd use to describe it is hopeless. The only “happy” moment we really get is Ben and Ned’s embrace, but even that is really Ben empathize get with Ned’s pain. I wouldn't call Ben feeling pain for his brother’s loss “happy.” By the end of the movie, Felix dies, thousands of others have died, and AIDS is a bigger problem than it was at the beginning of the movie. It's only getting worse. There is no hope for any of these men. When Ned was sitting alone at Yale, it's almost as if he was crying for not only himself, but all those gay men at the dance. At any time, they could go through the exact thing that Ned just went through.
3) The biggest thing I took out of this movie was the idea of self liberation and pride in oneself and who you are. Looking at Bruce, not only was he afraid to come out due to political reasons, Ned also accuses him of being ashamed of who he is, as a gay man. I think Ned cares much less about the political reasons Bruce wants to stay in the closet, and really just wants him to accept who he is, like he wants his brother to accept who he is. Self liberation extends far past pride in being gay. It can be pride in your race, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, origin, maybe the fact that you are adopted, or even pride in who you choose to love. You can have pride in any aspect of yourself and your culture, and that's part of what I think this movie is about.
1. The Normal Heart did what it was written to do. It made me sad and outraged. The idea that this disease would be so wholly ignored by the government is horrific. It's the idea of being that powerless as everyone around you died. At times it was stilted or melodramatic, but the story is powerful enough that I could forgive it for that. It's hard to cover AIDS without being dramatic at times. The relationship with Felix did go especially over the top. Despite this, the movie pulled me in. It got me to like and root for an occasionally unpleasant character. I give it a solid thumbs-up.
ReplyDelete2. We know life will go on, there will be more gay people. A generation is lost, and that's a huge deal, but there are survivors. Also, we see a slightly younger generation of gay people at Yale, a generation that doesn't have to face the same fear and confusion that Ned or Mickey did about being gay. The ending shows that despite all the heartbreak and death, there's still life. And they've done something great, they've cleared the path for a younger generation to be comfortable in who they are. Even if there is still job discrimination and hate, these younger people know they aren't alone.
3. Clearly people decided it was worth it to do a revival in 2011 and make a movie of The Normal Heart, even when the worst of the AIDS epidemic is past, and there's funding for research. This means it's more than just an angry rant at the world for ignoring a problem. It's more than just Larry Kramer's cry for help. It's about making the most of what you have, even when fighting for a fair share. Despite the stress and fear of AIDS, Felix and Ned love each other and carve out their own piece of happiness. Even if they don't have what they deserved, they take what they can. It's about the importance of fighting for what you need and for what others need. Ned fights furiously from the start, even before Felix is sick, not only because he is in danger, but because somebody has to. He takes that responsibility. But the movie also shows that he alone can do nothing. Above all The Normal Heart tells everyone in a position of power to remember those who aren't, to speak up for whoever is in trouble. Whether it's Jews in the Holocaust or gay men in New York City, you have to say something before it's too late.