''We Were Here'' is a 2011 American
documentary film
A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...
about the
HIV/AIDS
Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual ...
crisis in
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
.
The film, produced and directed by
David Weissman
David Weissman is an American screenwriter and director, most known for his comedies. He frequently collaborates with David Diamond. Diamond and Weissman met in high school, at Akiba Hebrew Academy (now Jack M. Barrack Hebrew Academy). They gradu ...
with editor and co-director
Bill Weber, premiered at the
Sundance Film Festival
The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,66 ...
in January 2011, with its international festival premiere following at the
Berlin International Film Festival in February 2011. The theatrical premiere took place at the
Castro Theatre in San Francisco on February 25, 2011.
People interviewed
The film focuses on 5 different interviews of people that had a protagonist role during the epidemic. These people are, in order of appearance:
* Ed Wolf, a
counselor
Counselor or counsellor may refer to:
A professional In diplomacy and government
* Counsellor of State, senior member of the British royal family to whom the Monarch can delegate some functions in case of unavailability
* Counselor (dipl ...
to many gay men
* Paul Boneberg, a political activist
* Daniel Goldstein, an HIV+ artist who lost 2 partners to AIDS
* Guy Clark, a dancer who ran a corner flower stand near the Castro, supplying flowers to many funerals
* Eileen Glutzer, a nurse who helped administer
clinical trial
Clinical trials are prospective biomedical or behavioral research studies on human participants designed to answer specific questions about biomedical or behavioral interventions, including new treatments (such as novel vaccines, drugs, dietar ...
s for
antiretroviral drugs
The management of HIV/AIDS normally includes the use of multiple antiretroviral drugs as a strategy to control HIV infection. There are several classes of antiretroviral agents that act on different stages of the HIV life-cycle. The use of multipl ...
Reception
''We Were Here'' holds a 100% "certified fresh" rating on review aggregator
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
and a 94 rating on
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, the highest among films of 2011.
Awards
See also
* ''
And the Band Played On'' (1993)
* ''
How to Survive a Plague
''How to Survive a Plague'' is a 2012 American documentary film about the early years of the AIDS epidemic, and the efforts of activist groups ACT UP and TAG. It was directed by David France, a journalist who covered AIDS from its beginnings. Fr ...
'' (2012)
References
External links
*
''We Were Here''on ''
Independent Lens
''Independent Lens'' is a weekly television series airing on PBS featuring documentary films made by independent filmmakers. Past seasons of ''Independent Lens'' were hosted by Angela Bassett, Don Cheadle, Susan Sarandon, Edie Falco, Terrence Ho ...
''
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:We Were Here
2011 films
2011 documentary films
American documentary films
Documentary films about HIV/AIDS
HIV/AIDS in American films
Documentary films about San Francisco
LGBT history in San Francisco
2010s English-language films
2010s American films
Films about infectious diseases
Films about viral outbreaks