Longtime Companion (1989) on Netflix
In the summer of 1981, Willy, a personal trainer, and friends gather on Fire Island as the first newspaper reports of a "gay cancer" reach New York.
- Netflix3.6/5
- IMDb7.6/106,573 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes91%
Trailer
Plot summary
Perhaps the first film to put a human face on the AIDS epidemic, Longtime Companion follows the lives of a small circle of friends from the first mention of the disease in the New York Times in 1981. First referred to as "Gay-Related-Immune-Disorder," we watch the effect of the disease as it devastates the lives of our protagonists. Jumping between Manhattan and Fire Island, vignettes carry us from the it-couldn't-happen-to-me mentality of the early days of the disease to the invasive effect it has had on all of our lives, today. The title of the film comes from the New York Times' refusal to acknowledge homosexual relationships in their obituary section during this period. Instead, survivors were referred to as "Longtime Companions" of the deceased.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Longtime Companion (1989)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Longtime Companion was the first wide-release theatrical film to take on AIDS, and it borrowed its title from the phrase The New York Times used in the 1980s for the surviving same-sex partner of a man who had died of the disease.
