David France's rousing and inspirational documentary should be required viewing for political activists everywhere.

Full Review | May 26, 2020

There are personal glimpses into the home lives of activists that left many in my theater wiping their tears on their coat sleeve.

Full Review | May 10, 2016

A compellingly watchable portrait of a battle fought under that most memorable rallying cry: "Silence = Death". Bravo.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 11, 2013

This inspirational, unexpectedly hilarious film is a patchwork of archival footage that takes us up to the present day.

Full Review | Nov 8, 2013

This documentary by David France persuasively argues that one of the greatest grassroots activist campaigns of modern times was the Act Up movement ...

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 7, 2013

David France's documentary about the 1980s/90s American gay community and its leading role in discovering "combination therapy" - the anti-HIV magic bullet - will be inspiring among audiences from the G20.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 7, 2013

This raw and passionate AIDS treatment doc suffers from a simple lack of focus.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Nov 7, 2013

It's no whitewash: important activists from the era admit how much time was lost through internecine squabbling, as well as the struggles they faced against the pitiless anti-gay rhetoric of their political opponents.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 7, 2013

It can't be long before we see the Hollywood version.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 5, 2013

A moving treatment of a deeply personal subject (France's own partner died of an AIDS-related illness in 1992), and an enthralling depiction of a seriously fired-up popular movement.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 4, 2013

David France has made an absorbing film to document that moment of immense implosion, called How to Survive a Plague.

Full Review | Jun 17, 2013

As this stirring, scrupulous doc reveals, the members of ACT UP fused the fervor of revolutionaries, the tenacity of trial lawyers, and the rage of the dispossessed to change the very shape of the epidemic.

Full Review | Original Score: A- | Jan 7, 2013

Plague offers an instructive lesson for Occupy-era rabble-rousers: Only when coupled with a knowledge base will your sound and fury signify anything.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Jan 7, 2013

From a terrible epidemic comes a beautiful documentary.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jan 7, 2013

A raw history, often cluttered and sometimes repetitive but, when strategies fail along with immune systems, deeply affecting.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Nov 2, 2012

Presents a valuable template for how grassroots activism can temper societal prejudice and challenge governmental indifference in the face of a mysterious and remorseless killer.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Nov 1, 2012

A serious, moving and sometimes astonishingly well-organized documentary about the history of AIDS activism.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Oct 18, 2012

[A] powerful, messy and tremendously moving documentary ...

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Oct 18, 2012

"How to Survive a Plague" captures a saddening, maddening era that seems like far too many lifetimes ago.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Oct 12, 2012

It can feel inchoate, dropping the viewer in the middle of events without much context, and it exacts an emotional toll. But its raw quality also makes it compelling viewing.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Oct 11, 2012