
The story of the onset of the HIV-AIDS crisis in New York City in the early 1980s, taking an unflinching look at the nation's sexual politics as gay activists and their allies in the medical community fight to expose the truth about the burgeoning epidemic to a city and nation in denial.... (Full plot summary below)
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The story of the onset of the HIV-AIDS crisis in New York City in the early 1980s, taking an unflinching look at the nation's sexual politics as gay activists and their allies in the medical community fight to expose the truth about the burgeoning epidemic to a city and nation in denial.
Leave your thoughts about The Normal Heart.
| Wall Street JournalNancy DeWolf SmithIn a film directed by Ryan Murphy and with strong performances, including those by Mr. Ruffalo, Ms. Roberts, Matt Bomer, Jim Parsons and Alfred Molina, Mr. Mantello's anguished lament may be the most haunting. |
| SlateWilla PaskinThe Normal Heart is a blunt, effective instrument, a handsome, walloping cudgel that begins in gay paradise on the eve of the apocalypse: Fire Island, 1982. |
| Boston GlobeMatthew GilbertThe powerful film, adapted from the 1985 play by Larry Kramer, joins the best of the genre - Longtime Companion, Parting Glances, An Early Frost, Philadelphia, the shattering documentary Silverlake Life - as a monument to the lives lost. |
| The New RepublicEric SassonThere is less reporting on poverty in America than on any other major societal issue. So it is with AIDS. That alone makes The Normal Heart an important film. |
| RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoPerhaps it's time for a film about the AIDS crisis that's this emotional, in-your-face, and even manipulative. Be moved. Be angry. |
| New York TimesNeil GenzlingerIt's a frightening thing to see, and an example of how Mr. Kramer and Mr. Murphy take one of the play's strong points and, through the flexibility afforded by film, make it even more powerful. |
| USA TodayRobert BiancoYou will learn lessons that should not be forgotten about the fear, foolishness, prejudice and intentional blindness that doomed millions to die who might otherwise have been saved. But the anger that lesson should provoke is either muted or missing. |
| Cleveland Plain DealerMark DawidziakIt is a movie packed with sublime performances and searingly memorable moments. |
| VarietyBrian LowryA character-oriented drama with theatrical talent and values that would face challenges finding much purchase at the modern-day multiplex. The result is a movie, for mostly better and sometimes worse, that wears its heart on its sleeve. |
| AV ClubBrandon NowalkUnfortunately, powerful as the play is, Ryan Murphy's adaptation of it makes for a cinematic tearjerker that's more relentless than it is masterful. |