motives

In one of many great scenes in 'The Constant Gardener', Fiennes tells his pregnant wife Tessa (Rachel Weisz) that they cannot give a young woman, her baby, and her son a ride. He argues that there are too many people that need to be helped. She would start with this family. The argument uncomfortably ends with Justin's decision. He has to look after Tessa's health and drives away.

It's a scene that is repeated over and over in this movie, not just with Justin but with those that Justin encounters. Justin, in this scene, reminds me of myself and pretty much everyone I know. All seem to be solid, nice people who wants to protect those they love at the cost of those they don't know. Somehow, I found this affability more disturbing than the premise of large pharmaceutical companies warping drug tests to produce more favorable results.

Notwithstanding, the chemist and doctor in me is still disturbed by this imagery, especially when it contrasts sharply with Tessa's exclamations at the beginning of the movie about nevarapine and its preventive powers for mother-to-child HIV transmission. If, as a character observes that "no drug company does something for nothing," then is it a monolith of people or individuals who are responsible?

Is it enough to know that if you cannot help everyone that you should not help anyone? What inspires people to act?

Note: Fernando Meirelles directed "City of God," another equally thought-provoking movie.