Philadelphia

This movie begins by depicting a bright articulate young lawyer named Andrew Beckett at work. Then the scene rapidly changes to Andrew at an AIDS clinic. You know at this point that Andrew Beckett has AIDS and a horrifying future as you see scenes of men with hollow expressions, open sores and skeleton-like features. It becomes obvious that Andrew was not telling his boss or coworkers that he has AIDS. Later we discover that he concealed this disease because he was afraid of being fired and people’s fear of him as a sick gay man.

One night as he is working late, he is called to the Chief Executive’s office. The Chief bestows his confidence and trust in him by giving him the responsibility over a crucial case and announces his promotion as Senior Associate. After the announcement has been made one of the senior executives notices an AIDS lesion on Andrew’s forehead. He asks Andrew about it. Andrew was momentarily disturbed by the question then quickly explains that he had bumped his head. We find out later that this senior executive had a previous secretary who had AIDS and was aware of what AIDS lesions looked like. The camera focuses on this executive staring at Andrew suspiciously.

Nine days later Andrew’s health conditions worsens and he is seen covered with lesions. He is feverish, vomiting, etc. He works hard at home to conceal the severity of his illness. Even with his illness, he manages to pull the case documents together and is ready to go to court. His friends help him with make up to cover his visible sores. He goes in late at night to place the court documents in the center of his desk, but they mysteriously disappear from his desk the next morning and there is no trace of them on his computer. He almost misses the court filing deadline and, just at the last minute, a hardcopy is suddenly found. The next day Andrew is fired for the incident.

Just before this court document fiasco, Andrew became very ill and was rushed to the Emergency Room for treatment. His gay partner came into the ER worried. His partner was anxious and sharp with the doctor who threaten to throw him out of the hospital because he was not really a member of Andrew’s family. This angers Andrew’s partner, but Andrew quickly apologized and he is allowed to stay. It was at that moment that Andrew received a phone call from work informing him that the court documents were missing. He left the hospital against the Doctors advise to try and locate the documents.

The camera focuses on a very physically depleted Andrew who is seeking legal counsel to sue the law firm that fired him because he believes that he was fired for having AIDS. He believes that his boss deliberately sabotaged the documents to make him look bad so they could fire him for incompetence rather than his illness. Many lawyers turned down his case. He sought help from an African American man named Joseph Miller and Miller turned his request down because he was gay and he was afraid of getting the AIDS virus from Andrew. During the time Andrew was in Miller’s office, Miller’s face was visibly fearful as Andrew touched things on his desk. Miller told Andrew that he didn’t