Rachel Sandler's story will resonate: Girl gets knocked up, guy doesn't use a rubber, girl crumbles when his HIV-positive status leaks. The 17-year-old's frantic first-time spirals into a hellish nightmare that's chronicled on Lifetime's docu-style film "Girl, Positive."
There are three factors, though, that make Rachel's story atypical. She's just getting acquainted with doing the dirty. She's white. And, well, she's obviously not a gay man.
The flick, with its onslaught of facts – like the number of teens living with the virus and the ease in which it can spread – and wise words from AIDS clinic volunteers Sarah Bennett (Jennie Garth) and Ariel Winters (S.Epatha Merkerson), breaks down HIV stereotypes that have plagued the gay community for years. By featuring a young, not-so-slutty white female (played by "Desperate Housewives" star Andrea Bowen), there's a message (among many in the one-and-a-half hour PSA-type flick) that the network is sending to its slew of soccer moms, its gaggle of girl viewers and (surprise! surprise!) gay guys.
After the once-sunny teen finds out the school's cool kid, who dies in the film's opening scenes, used heroin and contracted HIV, she retraces a night of drunken debauchery that led to rubber-less sex. At the same time, an insecure substitute teacher, Sarah, is dealing with the virus, which is hinted at in the openings scenes as she's seen downing drugs.
When Sarah first comes to class, she appropriately discusses fear-spreading epidemics, and asks students to name a few. One pupil pitches AIDS – noting that its killed a plethora of gay guys. But Sarah, whose throat lump when stating the following is the size of a golf ball, defeats it: "Gay men are not the only ones affected by HIV."
Sarah, who struggles to dive back into the dating pool, works with Ariel, a joshing lesbian who points out that high school students are practically banging in the hallways. She's an endless abyss of witty remarks, including a zinger she throws at Sarah after she returns from a date and mentions all they did was eat and discuss the weather: "I'm a lesbian, not a moron."
Appropriately, that's one of few laughs in the tech-savvy flick, which works blogging, MySpace and webcams into its awareness message solely to give the film an up-to-date appeal. It also offers tidbits on recent advancements in HIV medications, side effects, the more recent rapid test and the now-common notion: HIV is not a death sentence. To achieve the documentary style, the film seesaws between the main storyline and a school blog video, courtesy of a fellow student, that offers pupils' testimonials on their "no glove, no love" beliefs and befriending HIV-positive people.
Sure, acting is subpar and some of the dialogue (courtesy of Nancey Silvers) – like a scene where Sarah reaches out to Rachel and tells the story of an HIV-positive pupil in denial, and then reveals it was she – smells like cheese. Both Bowen and Garth seem poised for little more than an after school special, while Merkerson steals the show with witty one liners and a bubbly presence.
But, despite its so-so acting and cliched storyline flaws, Lifetime deserves kudos. The female-geared network (and, yep, gay guys dig it, too) is bold enough to erase HIV stereotypes through a progressive film that uses one youngster's horror to remind a mess of other folks that they're not invisible. And that's positively admirable.
'Girl, Positive'
Lifetime Televison
9 p.m. June 25
B-
