Information
Logline
Against the backdrop of the rising AIDS epidemic in 1985 New Mexico, families and friends, straight and queer, faithful and doubting, navigate shattering truths that reveal how crisis can fracture a community and, unexpectedly, bring people closer together.
Boilerplate (for press use)
COLORS OF THE SUN is an independent feature film produced by Asphodel Meadow Films, JEML Productions and 9 Point Productions. It explores love, grief, chosen family, and the quiet moments that define our relationships. With a powerful ensemble cast and intimate storytelling, COLORS OF THE SUN highlights the bonds that remain even when life is at its most fragile.
Film Overview
COLORS OF THE SUN is a deeply human drama exploring love, loss, and chosen family. Set against an emotionally charged backdrop, the film follows interconnected lives as they navigate grief, identity, and the urgent need for connection. With raw honesty and powerful performances, COLORS OF THE SUN examines what it means to show up for one another when it matters most.
What sets this film apart is its perspective: an ensemble portrait of the 1985 AIDS crisis in Albuquerque, New Mexico, an area rarely depicted in narratives about the epidemic. Through six storylines spanning straight and queer families, religious conflict, denial, caregiving, and newfound identity, the film captures the human cost of a crisis that reached far beyond major cities. It is a deeply personal, emotionally layered look at how fear, misinformation, and love collided in communities that history has often left out of the conversation.
History Press - Edward D Padilla
“In 1985, at the height of fear and silence surrounding the AIDS crisis in Albuquerque, Edward D Padilla did something extraordinary: he walked into the city’s minimally staffed AIDS ward with a yellow pad and a cassette recorder, and he listened.
While much of the country turned away, Edward sat with patients, partners, nurses, volunteers, and families. He recorded their stories at a time when no one else was documenting our local history. Those interviews became one of the only firsthand archives of Albuquerque’s early AIDS experience, a history that would have been lost without him.
Today, decades later, those voices are finally coming to life in a modest but deeply heartfelt film, Colors of the Sun, drawn from the interviews he preserved. Edward is not just the writer and director, he is the keeper of a chapter of Albuquerque’s history that was nearly erased. His work ensures that the people who lived, loved, fought, and died in that era are remembered with dignity.”
