unpublished excerpts from my abridged review The Normal Heart 2014 at http://www.moviequotesandmore.com
...
Likely the most honest answer to Ned's demanding query regarding the unspoken conspiracy of damning silence on the part of the media and key political figures is that the latter considered the so-called "gay cancer" to be just that, an illness affecting only gay men and therefore unimportant to to the welfare of the larger society.
More bluntly, as homophobic posters proclaimed, many people believed that "AIDS is the cure for gays." The Normal Heart can be likened to a horror film, as perceptive critics have noted; healthy young men are falling victim at a terrifying rate to a hovering specter of death that cannot be identified or defeated. More frightening still, there is no rescue team of heroes come to save the day, only a pervasive and chilling quiet on all fronts. Thousands and thousands die, mourned by helpless friends and lovers and family, yet are otherwise isolated by an uncaring world that persists in living in complacent ignorance or, even more distressingly, a gleeful sense of vindicated prejudice.
...
The Normal Heart opens on a conspicuously hedonist beach gathering populated by sculpted male bodies reveling in newfound sexual freedom. The gay celebration is temporarily brought to a halt when the birthday boy collapses. Though he seems to speedily recover, the scene is a harbinger of grim events to come. Seeing friends and acquaintances suddenly sinking into deathly illness, Ned Weeks (Mark Ruffalo) seeks the help of childhood polio-stricken Dr. Emma Brookner (Julia Roberts), the only medical practitioner who cares to take on AIDS patients. Though she rightly suspects that AIDS is a sexually transmitted disease and counsels gay men to to abstain, the audience, unwilling to surrender the sexual pursuits they view as a sign of liberation, mocks her advice. "I hope she winds this up," one man jeers, "because I've got a tiny little orgy in New Rochelle."
...
At one point Felix says an inspiring line, "Men don't naturally not love. They learn not to," which would normally be poetic did it not so suddenly interrupt an otherwise mundane dialogue as though he is engaging in a different conversation, with someone else. On that note, the exchanges between Ned and Felix border on tediousness--Bomer and Ruffalo gamely attempt to emote lines in such as a way as to show their tenderness for each other, but the result, due more to questionable dialogue than anything else, is discouragingly dull. Generally one (Ned) will relate a blandly un-virtuous story, and the other (Felix) will chuckle as though Ned has said something clever and worthy of amusement. The foundation of their relationship seems extremely unsound, beginning as it does with a weird near-pornographic sequence. Note that I am not necessarily bothered by the bodily nudity and explicitness of their actions, but I feel their first meeting and the immediateness of their ensuing sexual relations is dreadfully abrupt; by mentioning pornography I am referring to the poor setup of story regularly used in such graphic films in order to quickly sprint to the sex scene. Paraphrasing the words of Ned in his book, sexual promiscuity can, if not preclude love, then cheapen it. Perhaps I speak from an overly conservative stance and therefore I do not have real understanding of the circumstances under which said promiscuity operated.
Much has already been made of Bomer's striking weight loss, so I will only briefly mention that it is absolutely startling behold Felix's rapid debilitation and weakness. As his illness accelerates, Felix becomes a better formed personality in terms of the script and Bomer starts to more fully inhabit him as a character, rather than only using his signature charm to play Felix. I believe that Ruffalo, whose Ned is supposed to be infamous for his inability to rein in his passions, does not adequately fill his role. The scene in which Ned in a moment of hopeless exasperation throws vegetables at a despairing Felix, approaches the illusion of truth but does not reach far enough.
...
The fairly frequent monologues by the main characters are uneasily, sometimes even blatantly, inserted and cause the script to droop in revealing heavy-handedness that the actors cannot overcome.
...
Disdain for and fear of the gay community and thus the social and political decision to do nothing is a diseased spot on the history of civil rights activism. In persisting to ignore the crisis people in positions of authority allowed the disease to continue spreading like the lesions on the body of an AIDs victim, unstoppable and incurable.
...
Please note that the above are incomplete thoughts finalized in the actual review on the moviequotes website.
...
Likely the most honest answer to Ned's demanding query regarding the unspoken conspiracy of damning silence on the part of the media and key political figures is that the latter considered the so-called "gay cancer" to be just that, an illness affecting only gay men and therefore unimportant to to the welfare of the larger society.
More bluntly, as homophobic posters proclaimed, many people believed that "AIDS is the cure for gays." The Normal Heart can be likened to a horror film, as perceptive critics have noted; healthy young men are falling victim at a terrifying rate to a hovering specter of death that cannot be identified or defeated. More frightening still, there is no rescue team of heroes come to save the day, only a pervasive and chilling quiet on all fronts. Thousands and thousands die, mourned by helpless friends and lovers and family, yet are otherwise isolated by an uncaring world that persists in living in complacent ignorance or, even more distressingly, a gleeful sense of vindicated prejudice.
...
The Normal Heart opens on a conspicuously hedonist beach gathering populated by sculpted male bodies reveling in newfound sexual freedom. The gay celebration is temporarily brought to a halt when the birthday boy collapses. Though he seems to speedily recover, the scene is a harbinger of grim events to come. Seeing friends and acquaintances suddenly sinking into deathly illness, Ned Weeks (Mark Ruffalo) seeks the help of childhood polio-stricken Dr. Emma Brookner (Julia Roberts), the only medical practitioner who cares to take on AIDS patients. Though she rightly suspects that AIDS is a sexually transmitted disease and counsels gay men to to abstain, the audience, unwilling to surrender the sexual pursuits they view as a sign of liberation, mocks her advice. "I hope she winds this up," one man jeers, "because I've got a tiny little orgy in New Rochelle."
...
At one point Felix says an inspiring line, "Men don't naturally not love. They learn not to," which would normally be poetic did it not so suddenly interrupt an otherwise mundane dialogue as though he is engaging in a different conversation, with someone else. On that note, the exchanges between Ned and Felix border on tediousness--Bomer and Ruffalo gamely attempt to emote lines in such as a way as to show their tenderness for each other, but the result, due more to questionable dialogue than anything else, is discouragingly dull. Generally one (Ned) will relate a blandly un-virtuous story, and the other (Felix) will chuckle as though Ned has said something clever and worthy of amusement. The foundation of their relationship seems extremely unsound, beginning as it does with a weird near-pornographic sequence. Note that I am not necessarily bothered by the bodily nudity and explicitness of their actions, but I feel their first meeting and the immediateness of their ensuing sexual relations is dreadfully abrupt; by mentioning pornography I am referring to the poor setup of story regularly used in such graphic films in order to quickly sprint to the sex scene. Paraphrasing the words of Ned in his book, sexual promiscuity can, if not preclude love, then cheapen it. Perhaps I speak from an overly conservative stance and therefore I do not have real understanding of the circumstances under which said promiscuity operated.
Much has already been made of Bomer's striking weight loss, so I will only briefly mention that it is absolutely startling behold Felix's rapid debilitation and weakness. As his illness accelerates, Felix becomes a better formed personality in terms of the script and Bomer starts to more fully inhabit him as a character, rather than only using his signature charm to play Felix. I believe that Ruffalo, whose Ned is supposed to be infamous for his inability to rein in his passions, does not adequately fill his role. The scene in which Ned in a moment of hopeless exasperation throws vegetables at a despairing Felix, approaches the illusion of truth but does not reach far enough.
...
The fairly frequent monologues by the main characters are uneasily, sometimes even blatantly, inserted and cause the script to droop in revealing heavy-handedness that the actors cannot overcome.
...
Disdain for and fear of the gay community and thus the social and political decision to do nothing is a diseased spot on the history of civil rights activism. In persisting to ignore the crisis people in positions of authority allowed the disease to continue spreading like the lesions on the body of an AIDs victim, unstoppable and incurable.
...
Please note that the above are incomplete thoughts finalized in the actual review on the moviequotes website.