Three Needles (3 Needles) (2005)

Epic in scope but intimate in presentation, Thom Fitzgerald's visually stunning 3 Needles intercuts three narratives set on different continents. Each story confronts our inability to address the great plague of the late-twentieth century. But Fitzgerald doesn't simply catalogue our innumerable failures in dealing with epidemics; he also focuses on our capacity to exploit those who suffer. With epidemic levels of AIDS infection in South Africa, a group of nuns - Sister Hilde (Olympia Dukakis), Sister Mary (Sandra Oh) and the devout but rebellious novice Clara (Chloë Sevigny) - arrive to save as many souls as possible, but soon realize their help is needed more in the here and now. Meanwhile, young Montreal actor Denny (Shawn Ashmore) works in porn to support his parents while struggling to hide secrets of his own from his employers and his mother (Stockard Channing). And in rural China, Jin Ping (Lucy Liu) sets up a blood-donor clinic, paying five dollars apiece to contributors. When his family and neighbours begin to fall ill, young farmer Tong Sam (Tanabadee Chokpikultong) courageously sets out to uncover the truth. Fitzgerald demonstrates a complex awareness of his characters and their contexts. Ignorance, of both disease and cultural difference, plays a central role in the film; characters' seemingly altruistic acts have unforeseen, negative repercussions. When Clara tries to use force to stop an HIV-positive young man from having sex indiscriminately, she only creates greater tension and resentment within the local community. Poverty is a prime motivator for many of those who exploit or endanger others here, though tellingly, it's only in the North American story that the principals seem to do so consciously. Fitzgerald thus indirectly indicts the West's refusal to respond to the spread of AIDS and other diseases worldwide. His sweeping but complicated narrative constantly disrupts our expectations, placing us - like his characters - in situations we don't entirely understand. Driven by an all-encompassing sense of grief and anguish, 3 Needles also recognizes the possibility of hope and redemption in taking positive action.