Essential Queer Docs: How to Survive a Plague

2012’s HOW TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE (110 min) weaves a portrait of the rage, grief, love and action of the early AIDS epidemic that is essential viewing in the canon of queer documentaries. Director and journalist David France began covering and reporting on the AIDS crisis in the early 1980s, and drew from over 700 hours of archival footage to create this essential & moving portrait of the time. 

In this class, we’ll delve into the importance of not only documenting our queer and trans lives and fights for liberation as they happen, but of taking up these essential texts as guidance to continue the fights highlighted in the film. Doing so, we’ll explore the political potential of queer documentary, tracing the lineage of the activist groups in the film to our contemporary movements for queer and trans rights, disability and Covid justice — and celebrate our collective power along the way.

This class will be taught by MMU Instructor Max Swanson, a filmmaker/performer, writer, educator, and organizer based in Portland, OR.

Class size will be limited to 18.

Questions? Email us at education@moviemadness.org