Telling Pictures

Narrated by Dustin Hoffman
Academy Award, Best Feature Documentary (1989) 

An Olympic athlete; a gay activist; a boy with hemophilia; a recovering heroin addict; a closeted Navy commander: five very diverse lives that shared a common fate.  Their lives—along with thousands of others—are woven together in a giant memorial patchwork quilt, that is solemnly unfolded in the US capitol to protest the government's refusal to respond to a growing epidemic. Common Threads tells the powerful story of the first decade of the AIDS epidemic in the US.

"Slams through stereotypes … Slowly, carefully, powerfully, Common Threads takes the cold statistics and gives them very recognizable faces."
  -  The New York Times

"A great documentary."
- The Washington Post

"As powerful and moving a documentary as you will ever see. A+."
- People

"A documentary with the cumulative emotional impact of great tragedy."
- Los Angeles Times

"Simply stunning…a study in devotion and anger and courage at a dark time. And through it all, it’s love that shines the brightest."
-Variety

Academy Award
Best Feature Documentary

George Foster Peabody Award
University of Georgia School of Journalism