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Miss Evers' Boys
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In Stock
Price:
$9.98
$3.50*
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| Part No: | B00005RDAN |
| Manufacturer: | Hbo Home Video |
| MFG Part: | HBOD91389D |
| Customer Rating: | 4.5 / 5.0 |
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Laurence Fishburne helped shepherd this Emmy Award-winning exposé from American medical history books to the small screen. Anchored in the 1973 Senate inquiry into the infamous Tuskegee Study, the film uses a flashback structure to take us back 40 years as Nurse Eunice Evers (played with honest conviction by Alfre Woodard, who also earned an acting Emmy for her powerful performance) describes how a program designed to treat syphilis among blacks in the South was twisted into an inhuman study. Evers's conscience is torn between leaving her position on principle or remaining to give the dying men what comfort she can while they are systematically refused life-saving medicine at every turn. Fishburne costars as Caleb, a easygoing but ambitious young fieldhand who discovers the cold reality of the study while courting Miss Evers. Adapted by Walter Bernstein from a play by David Feldshuh, the film rises above the TV Movie of the Week mold with a complex moral structure that eschews (if you'll pardon the expression) black and white polarities for shades of gray as the doctors' initial compromises become a lifetime of lies. Ultimately that tone becomes the most disturbing facet of the drama: doctors and nurses so enmeshed in what is tantamount to a conspiracy they can find no way out, and a government that searches for scapegoats for its own cold-blooded research.
--Sean Axmaker
This shocking true story exposes a 40 year government medical research effort on humans which led to tragic consequences. A federally funded program to treat syphilis patients has its funds withdrawn. Now money is offered on what will become known as the tuskegee experiment on unknowing black patients. Studio: Hbo Home Video Release Date: 01/25/2005 Starring: Alfre Woodard Craig Scheffer Run time: 118 minutes Rating: Pg Director: Joseph Sargent
| informative | 2008-09-24 | 4 / 5 |
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| it's a great movie that allows you to see how the tuskegee study actually came about and how it took many years later for something to be done. its sad but informative. i loved it. |
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| I was impressed and pleased with the speed of delivery and the quality of the product. |
| Miss Evers Boys | 2008-04-09 | 4 / 5 |
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| I enjoyed it tremendously. (You'll have to watch out that it doesn't depress you). However, I found it to be noteworthy as it was historical and shed a bit of light on a situation that maybe some did not know ever existed. I would have liked it if the story would have dealt more with the government's ivolvement with the Tuskegee Project in preventing medicine to be given to the black men that were unknowingly used for this experiment. This story focused more on Miss Ever's commitment to the men, instead of the government's decision that these human beings were expendable. Excellent acting by Alfred Woodard & Laurence Fisburne. |
| Follows Historical Details | 2008-03-30 | 4 / 5 |
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| I had to be involved in a debate for school about the Tuskegee Incident. This video seems to follow history fairly accurately, unlike some of Hollywood's other 'based on real life' stories. |
| Every race responds to disease in the same manner | 2008-03-16 | 5 / 5 |
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Unfortunately, the "Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphillis in the Negro Male", which began in 1932 in Alabama, is strong proof that clinical studies were not created equal. In this experiment, poor African American males were not treated for syphillis and not told of their true condition.
When penicillin became available as a treatment, the subjects were not afforded the option of getting the shots. (NOTE: Depending on the stage of syphillis, penicillin may not be a safe treatment option)
As a result of unethical treatment on the part of the experimenters in this study, the US National Health Investigation Board was developed in 1979. This board promulgated Institutional Review Boards and ethical guidelines for the conduct of clinical research studies. None of the clinical staff of this study faced any criminal charges.
"Miss Evers Boys" is a made for television dramatization of the Tuskegee Study from the point of view of Nurse Eunice Evers (Woodard).
The film details the RN's enthusiastic enlistment into the study because she believed The New Deal was for everyone and was going to help African Americans.
According to the film, the original study offered treatment for syphillis patients--who were told they had 'bad blood' because the doctors believed most of the men would not understand the physiology of their disease.
Later, when treatment funds dried up, researchers were encouraged by the National Health Service to continue the study to determine the effects of the disease. At the time, they believed that monies for treatment would be available within six months to a year, tops. The experimenters were depicted as sympathetic and trapped in an unfortunate situation. The Congressional Hearing panel who conducted the expository hearings on this study apparently felt similarly because no researchers were charged with cruelty regarding this study.
The film is an excellent study in medical ethics. It's impossible to watch this movie without tears in your eyes and anger in your heart. I believe "Miss Evers Boys" would be a good education for students of Black History as well as medicine, nursing, and ethics. |
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