And the Band Played On

Based on HIV+-sufferer Randy Shilts' 1988 book, HBO Pictures brought us the very emotional, indeed enraging, 1993 teleplay of And The Band Played On. We see how a mysterious disease broke out in different parts of the world in the late 1970s with many unexplained deaths, but when the Center For Disease Control started investigating it in 1981 the deaths of gay men (homosexual had to be deleted from their report to ensure public attention) turned into deaths of Haitian refugees and then hemophiliacs and patients getting blood transfusions from blood donated by an AIDS patient. The virus could no longer be contained and the band played on.

The 141-minute movie, directed by Roger Spottiswoode and written for cable by Arnold Schulman from Shilts' book, seems to adroitly capture all the book's complexities of the initial tracking of the AIDS virus with quite a vengeance. I haven't read it, but from all the comments I've read that does seem likely. In any case the movie has a lot going on to help me realize the CDC's frustrations and to keep my attention.

Matthew Modine (Birdy) plays the engaging, young CDC virologist, Dr. Don Francis, who's determined to figure out how to stop the epidemic. He reminded me of the late James Stewart with his earnestness and affability, an excellent choice to lead us through the quagmire of political apathy (the Reagan administration), medical selfishness and greed, scientific research, religious condemnation, the gay community's denial and fear, the toll of deaths escalating relentlessly while some victims are tested or interviewed and a gay bathhouse visited. To further complicate matters for our virologist, he gets on the bad side on his boss and an 'eminent' U.S. scientist for doing all he can to save lives.

Some people might find some of the cast rather distracting, though they are brilliantly convincing in their roles: Alan Alda as a scheming scientist; Saul Rubinek as the difficult CDC superior; Richard Gere as the troubled, gay choreographer inspired by Michael Bennett who created "A Chorus Line;" Anjelica Huston; Lily Tomlin; Glenn Headly; Steve Martin; Phil Collins as a greedy bathhouse owner; Sir Ian McKellan as a gay man fighting to help his community stay alive; Swoosie Kurtz and many others.

I really enjoyed the often biting, rarely predictable dialogue as well, such as this:

Dr. Don Francis: This may be the first epidemic in history of which no one officially died.

Dr. Don Francis: How many people have to die before it'll be cost effective for you people to do something about it? A hundred? A thousand? Give us a number so we won't annoy you until the amount of money you start losing on LAWSUITS makes it more PROFITABLE for you to save people than to kill them!

And The Band Played On gave me insight into what the proud gay community was like in San Francisco in the early 1980s with their parades and need to keep the bathhouses open (they weren't closed until 1985). As Tomlin's activist character explained to the bewildered McKellan's gay character who never used a bathhouse, they are human and scared (to lose their sexual freedom and dignity).

This was quite a tumultuous time for all concerned. Of course, the movie is a dramatization based on facts and indubitably some license is taken to entertain a general audience. Rated PG-13 in the U.S., there is no sex and just a glimpse of a nude male. I don't remember being shocked by any language, although I saw some shocking death scenes in the beginning of the movie before the AIDS virus took hold (the Ebola Fever in central Africa, which was contained by the World Health Organization).

One flaw I picked up on during my second viewing was the fairly short lack of lip synchronization. I missed it the first time so you probably will too in your absorption of the story. It made me feel the gamut of emotions from wonder, frustration, anger, empathy and some amusement sprinkled in. I'm pretty sure you will too when you watch this multiple times.

While And The Band Played On ended in 1985 with Elton John's hauntingly beautiful song "The .Last Song" as it played during a montage of AIDS and HIV+ victims, plus AIDS activists, and a few paragraphs of what happened afterwards, I had to look up online for any new updates in the ongoing battle with the AIDS virus. Happily I discovered that just this month an announcement has been made for a very promising weapon against the virus. I read an article about it in a Seattle paper:

"Although so far limited to early test tube studies, CSA-54, one of a family of compounds called Ceragenins (or CSAs), mimics the disease-fighting characteristics of anti-microbial and anti-viral agents produced naturally by a healthy human immune system."

(http://www.sltrib.com/business/ci_3482712)

I enthusiastically recommend this award-winning movie to anyone interested in how people react to a crisis, not only the AIDS epidemic, and how we might learn from the mistakes made in the past so they won't happen again. I certainly don't want the band to keep playing on and on, do you?

Roger Gail Lyon: This is not a political issue. This is a health issue. This is not a gay issue. This is a human issue. And I do not intend to be defeated by it. I came here today in the hope that my epitaph would not read that I died of red tape.