Daybreak
Daybreak
R | 08 May 1993 (USA)
Daybreak Trailers

When a substantial portion of the nation's populace falls victim to a deadly plague, the tyrannical government quarantines them in camps, offering no alternative except death. But a gutsy rebel named Torch sets out to help the afflicted by leading an underground effort to spirit the victims to humane sanctuary.

Reviews
emanueltrinberry

With all of the big names such as Cuba Gooding jr, Omar Epps, and a few more Hollywood Heavy Hitters the movie omits racism, politics, and religion, while at the same time exposes how people feel about the government and health care, if you ask me, it introduced the Obama, Trump Era.

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Desertman84

Daybreak is an HBO Production based on Alan Bowne's acclaimed off- Broadway play Beirut.It stars Cuba Gooding,Jr and Moira Kelly.When a substantial portion of the nation's populace falls victim to a deadly plague, the tyrannical government quarantines them in camps, offering no alternative except death in this cautionary tale from director Stephen Tolkin.The film has been "opened-out" into an apocalyptic, romantic action- thriller. New York City is a fascist nightmare steeped in poverty and ridden with plague. Bands of armed officers under the rubric Operation Helping Hand roam the streets rounding up Positives, who are tattooed and quarantined in filthy hellholes. Blue, a poor but pretty young woman, stumbles onto a secret resistance group that rescue Positives to give them compassionate care. Blue falls in love with their courageous leader, Torch.It focuses on the relationship between these star-crossed lovers and the film's best moments do the same. It ever mentions AIDS by name, but it is clear that AIDS is the plague in question and the theme is the hysteria that the illness can generate. The horrible future these dramas foresaw did not come to pass. Since they were written, great medical strides have been made that have changed the face of AIDS. But fear and misinformation about the disease persist. AIDS remains a major health crisis worldwide and Daybreak could have been powerful film that deserves to be seen.Unfortunately,the film turned into a boring melodrama in the end.

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morgana-31

I watched this last night, as it was on a DVD with something else I could have survived without seeing. The first thing that came to mind was 1984. Bleak and miserable settings; people doing manual labor that you'd suspect they wouldn't be doing if they had a choice; and being urged to report on one another - all for their own good of course. And then, for some strange reason, the old Gregory Harrison TV series, Logan's Run, popped up - what they told you you'd get and what you actually got were two different things. Add just a tiny pinch of Brave New World, and WELCOME TO YOUR FUTURE.Of course, having not seen this until 2006, it all seems a bit far fetched now. When AIDS first appeared on the scene in the early 80s, far from introducing strict quarantine, there were calls for homosexuality to be legalized. And Political Correctness has now determined that illness - instead of making you a candidate for extermination - will more likely ensure that you'll never be found guilty of committing a crime. My illness made me do it! So a conceivable future? NOT IN MY LIFETIME.But love still was able to bloom, in this unlikely nightmare world, between a young freedom fighter and a new recruit to the cause. Perhaps the total abandon with which Blue conducted her sex life is indicative of how the disease got to be so rampant in the first place? Be warned, kiddies! Get it on before you get it off. Add a betrayal and then assistance from an unexpected source......Well at least it was something to do while I was waiting for my cat to come home.

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Robert Brockway

A few of the people making earlier comments missed the point of this film. The disease described wasn't AIDS-like, it was AIDS. I suspect a few viewers may be too young to remember the near hysteria of the mid to late 1980s that had otherwise rational people calling for all HIV positive people to be permanently interned.Clearly the writer(s) of Daybreak wanted to illustrate one possible future in which fear was allowed to win out. This has a strong message to send us in 2005 too.The love story was central to the movie as a chain is created from Ellen to Torch to Blue. Ellen was passionate about saving people. Neither Torch nor Blue started that way but took up the cause when the one they loved fell to the all powerful authorities. The lack of decisive ending, other than the continuation of the resistance, shows that not all problems are easily solved and can be nearly wrapped up in a 1.5 hour movie.

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