Film as 疗愈: Revisiting and reframing AIDS
Family, religion, sexuality, and stigma—these are the themes that pervade Professor 塞西莉亚Aldarondo’s debut documentary, 忏悔之心的回忆, which catalogues her investigation into her uncle Miguel’s death from AIDS 25 years 事后. In the film, Aldarondo scours family records in an attempt to uncover the identity of Miguel’s lover, Robert, whom she eventually succeeds in finding. 但 in unearthing this other half of her uncle’s life, she also unearths the resentments and frustrations experienced by those caught in the crosshairs of faith and sexuality. 的 result is a powerful document of remembrance, resurfaced suffering, and potential 疗愈.
塞西莉亚Aldarondo
的 film premiered as a selection of the 翠贝卡电影节 in April and was screened in Skidmore’s own Davis Auditorium in November. 筛选 was followed by a brief but productive conversation between Aldarondo and 英语 Professor Mason Stokes, in which they discussed the film’s production as well as the variety of ways in which it resonates with its viewers. 然后邀请了观众 问问题. Aldarondo answered each one earnestly and eagerly.
When asked about the impetus to make the film, Aldarondo coupled her own inherent interest in her family’s past with what she considered to be a somewhat lacking perspective HIV/AIDS电影的经典. On the process of marketing the film to potential funders, she spoke about the role of national and cultural identity in the context 艾滋病危机. 什么区别 记忆 from other documents that frame the AIDS epidemic is the explicitly rendered theme of physical and emotional displacement. Her uncle was a man of two localities—the artist’s world of mid-1980s New York City, where self-definition was within reach, and his childhood world of Puerto Rico, with its traditions of family and of faith. In that regard, the film takes on the enormous challenge of documenting what it is to be so many things at once: an artist, a friend, a brother, the son of religious mother, gay, a Puerto Rican immigrant, HIV positive—the list goes on. 这是Aldarondo bravery in confronting this complexity that makes 忏悔之心的回忆 非常有效.
For me, the film is the culmination of a semester’s worth of HIV+AIDS documents: archival footage, documentaries, Hollywood films, scholarly readings—even an audio archive Diamanda Galás的 鼠疫大规模, which is over an hour of operatic screaming meant in part to replicate of the experience 艾滋病的. All of these texts form the curriculum of Aldarondo’s 300-level 英语 class “HIV+AIDS in Film and Media,” in which I’m very gratefully enrolled. 所有这些 文件- - - - - -鼠疫大规模 included—have entered into my consciousness the beginnings of an understanding of 历史上的关键时刻.
Remembering isn’t enough, though, because HIV and AIDS are not something of the past. Watching Professor Aldarondo’s film, and then seeing the media attention to World AIDS day this past Thursday, it’s important to note that this disease is still widespread, especially in communities that are impoverished, marginalized, and all too often ignored. Both domestically and abroad, it’s important to see that there are still lives at stake, that the AIDS crisis isn’t over for everyone.
Aldarondo’s film adeptly captures this tension between the past and the present. 的 documentary is at once a testament to a life lost, a way of grappling with the implicit conflicts between faith, background, and identity, and an offering of some sort of reconcilable future, whatever that may be. It demands something of us all, specifically that we remember the lives lost from an epidemic perpetuated by an impotent government 主流媒体也乏乏可陈. More broadly, it demands that we not only understand one another, but that we fight for one another—regardless of the stigma.
This goes without saying, but if you get the chance, watch the film—it’s set to appear 作为 PBS的纪录片系列 观点 2017年的某个时候. In the meantime, check out the trailer below.
布莱恩·艾伦，17岁 is the 2016–17 student blogger in the Office of Communications and 市场营销. A double major in 英语 and 西班牙语 with a minor in media and film studies, he has provided a unique student insight to Life at Skidmore.