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May 8, 2014- By Steven E. Greer, MD
Matthew McConaughey won the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his portrayal of AIDS-stricken Ron Woodroof in “Dallas Buyers Club. Jared Leto won Best Supporting Actor for his role as the transvestite with AIDS, Rayon. However, the film was a box office flop, earning less than $30 Million domestic. That is because it was completely mis-marketed as a film about AIDS in the 80′s.
Dallas Buyers Club is a far more courageous film than just a politically correct depiction of the atrocities of the AIDS epidemic. While it does deliver a powerful message on AIDS, it also takes on the biggest industries in the world: Organized Medicine and Big Pharma.
Much of the film portrays the corruption of FDA-approved trials, run by doctors heavily paid by Big Pharma, and the FDA that enables the entire system. Given that Big Pharma is the biggest sources of revenue for mainstream TV news, Hollywood did not get the word out about Dallas Buyers Club.
There could be many sequels to Dallas Buyers Club, with Jennifer Garner as the Super Hero doctor. Instead of fighting for AIDS patients, she could next be fighting for patients driven to bankruptcy by $200,000 cancer drugs, or for the millions of patients conned by their doctors into taking cholesterol lowering drugs that do them no good, or the patients with strokes who took daily aspirin.
Given that healthcare is a $3 trillion industry, and 18% of the entire GDP, with MD’s as the gatekeepers of it all, it all makes perfect sense that Dallas Buyers Club was swept under the rug. This is a film worth renting.