The story of the discovery of the AIDS virus, from the early days in 1978, when San Francisco gays began dying from unknown causes, to the identification of the HIV virus. Bigots spoke of a gay plague, scientists fought for the kudos of being first to identify the cause, and disagreements beset San Francisco's gays over the closure of the bathhouses. The film, quite rightly, deals with these issues. find out more...

Derek Jarman faces up to AIDS, the loss of loved ones, the breakdown of the body, blindness and his own approaching fall into the void. The constant blue screen provides a backdrop for Jarman's words, which are delivered by a host of famous voices. His eloquence, and unsentimental account of his own plight are deeply moving. A challenging and abstract film. The dvd contains Glitterbug, a 60 minute collage of Jarman's super 8 footage which he shot between 1970-1986. find out more...

Carandiru was Brazil's largest prison, a grim enclosure that worked as a brutal self-regulating microcosm of the world outside it. The film is seen thru' the eyes of a doctor who gets to know the prisoners, drug dealers, rapists, murderers, remandees et al, and we get to know some of them thru' flashbacks to their pre-prison life. This is the story of how these men's time shuddered to a halt when riot police entered the compound in October 1992 and shot dead 111 unarmed prisoners. From the direc find out more...

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LA businessman Max (Snipes) is Mr Happily-Married-Nice-Guy, until he goes to New York to visit his HIV-positive best friend, Charlie, a towering performance from Robert Downey Jr. There he meets Nastassja Kinski, cops off with her for a night of passion, and returns to LA racked with guilt, whence his once blissful marriage begins to crumble. Returning to New York a year later to comfort the now dying Charlie, Max's monumental indiscretion comes back to haunt him when Kinski reappears. Soul-sear find out more...

Hanks deservedly won an Oscar for his portrayal of a brilliant young lawyer with AIDS, is sacked for "incompetence", and sues his bosses. Denzel Washington is superb as the homophobic brief who helps him fight the system. Excellent and thought-provoking. find out more...

Using Jarman's wooden shack on the pebble beaches of Dungeness as its visual focal point. The Garden is an allegorical tale that explores Jarman's views on Christianity in relation to homosexuality, and AIDS. A beautiful, ethereal film and a fine epitaph to a man with peerless vision. find out more...