in china and the unscrupulous pregnant smuggler of blood jin ping ( lucy liu ) infect an entire rural village in a province explore the poor and ignorant people . the poverty associate to the ignorance and greed doom the whole population to the tragic disease for u $ 5 . 00 per liter of blood . in canada and the second rate porn actor denys ( shawn ashmore ) hide from his director and colleague that he be hiv positive use the blood of his sick father for the test require by the production . when his father dy and his mother olive ( stockard channing ) discover his former profession and that her son have aid . she hire a u $ 2 and 000 and 000 . 00 life insurance while then she infect herself and sell and cash part of her insurance in advance to have a comfortable life with her son . in africa and the nun sister clara ( chloë sevigny ) and sister hilde francis ( olympia dukakis ) and sister mary john ( sandra oh ) come to a small mission to convert the villager in the catholicism . sister clara believe their mission be also to help the local and she self sacrifice her dignity to get financial support for the community . 3 needle be a well intentioned movie that disclose three different view of dissemination of aid in three panel . in the first one and poverty associate to the ignorance and greed sentence the dweller of a village while in the second and selfishness and need of money infects at least eight actor and actress of the porn industry while in the last one and ignorance and lack of resource doom the poor people to the disease . the screenplay be a little confused and flaw and and some of the question in the message board prove it . the first story be tragic and with an ironic conclusion when the dweller question that he sell his blood for u $ 5 . 00 and he pay u $ 10 . 00 for the test . the second one be of a tremendous dark humor and and i do not know whether the intention of the director or writer thom fitzgerald be to criticize the early cash of life insurance . the last one have an unnecessary tragedy in the end . nevertheless 3 needle be a good and honest and powerful movie about an unpleasant theme with top notch acting of the cast . my vote be seven . title ( brazil ) represent unidos pelo sangue ( tie by the blood ) .