'The Rise of the Killer Virus' Screens at Paley Center During Pulitzer Center Series

The Rise of the Killer Virus screens on Thursday, April 23, as part of the Pulitzer Center's film series at New York's Paley Center for Media. After the screening, director Carl Gierstorfer will discuss the film along with Pulitzer Center Executive Director Jon Sawyer, and additional speakers including two of the key medical researchers in the documentary who are seeking answers to the origins of HIV: Dr. Dirk Teuwen of Belgium, and Michael Worobey, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Arizona.

The European version of The Rise of the Killer Virus aired as The Bloody Truth and premiered in 2014 in advance of World AIDS Day. The documentary delves into the origins of HIV and is associated with Gierstorfer's Pulitzer Center-supported reporting project "HIV's Origins-And the Lessons for Today."

To follow the footsteps of researchers and discover the phases through which the disease has passed during its century-old history, visit the interactive. See also the Smithsonian Channel trailer.

The Rise of the Killer Virus is produced by DOCDAYS Production, YUZU Productions, CONGOO, for Smithsonian Networks, ZDF/ARTE, CCTV 10, RTBF, and VRT.

Writer & Director: Carl Gierstorfer
Director of Photography: Renaat Lambeets
Editor & Art Director: Marcel Ozan Riedel
Executive Producer: Antje Boehmert
Concept and Programming: Felix Nelson

Reception after the film and discussion.
Free and open to the public, but RSVP requested - please reserve your seat today.

Thursday, April 23
6:30 pm (doors open at 6 pm)
The Paley Center for Media
Bennack Theater
25 West 52nd Street
New York, NY 10019

The first film in the Pulitzer Center series at the Paley Center is The Abominable Crime on homophobia in Jamaica by Micah Fink and is associated with the Pulitzer Center-supported reporting project "Glass Closet: Sex, Stigma and HIV/AIDS in Jamaica."

The Abominable Crime is the 2014 Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival's inaugural Amnesty International Human Rights Prize for a Caribbean film that best highlights a human rights issue. The documentary screens at the Paley Center on Tuesday, April 21. Fink will participate in a post-screening discussion along with human rights lawyer Maurice Tomlinson, whose story is told in The Abominable Crime.