Now Voyager: Island Bay Fair and the Dallas Buyers Club

A perfect Wellington day for a fair, and this was big one, and great music, food and shopping for those who like such stuff.

I spent a few hours there at the beautiful Island bay, mainly collapsed in the heat, with block out on, and listened to a fabulous Reggae style band, in photo below..

They were really excellent, ready for export or not?

But my day had only just begun as I had booked to see a preview at the Cuba Lighthouse of the new Oscar nominated 'Dallas Buyers Cub' with the very popular Matthew McConaughey starring.

It was an amazing role for him and also his support, Jared Leto, both of whom lost a total of about fifty kilos to play the roles of dying drug addicted users. There are possible Oscars for both of them. But the story was fascinating, especially for me having lived in the middle of this history, some in the States and some in Australia.

It happened early in the AIDS crisis in 1985, when people with HIV were being made guinea pigs for the drug researchers, and the release of AZT was very disputed as it hadn't been double-blind tested. AZT was later discovered to be lethal in large doses which were unfortunately being given early on where many hundreds, even thousands, were dying. The true life character Ron, a homophobic straight person, having contracted HIV on one encounter with another drug addict, decides to go to Mexico and smuggle in some better drugs called Nuclear Peptides, which hadn't yet been passed by the FDA, the Food and Drug Administration. With a transgender business partner, Jared Leto, whom he reluctantly befriends, he mounts an alternate medication underground and they become known as the Dallas Buyers Club, selling memberships at $400 monthly and giving many infected people these unavailable drugs.

However they are very unpopular with the medical authorities who are obsessed with their own expensive research and their need to test all the drugs. Ron even takes the State to court but loses his case. Eventually he and his transgender friend die, having abused their bodies with other drugs a bit too much and also taken some AZT, which is basically poison. There is a final postscript saying the fight against AIDS is not yet over...very true.

As a historical movie it is accurate, and as a piece of cinematic art it is a great success, and it's also made on a mini budget. Incredibly, for a movie which nearly didn't get made, it has already grossed 29 million dollars. Certainly worth seeing for many reasons, but if only for the excellent acting. Four stars.