This documentary feature examines the social lives of a group of individuals with a variety of severe physical handicaps who are struggling to overcome their greatest handicap: isolation. They speak openly about their frustrations and their desire to “break through” to society and establish fulfilling social and sexual relationships. Director Marlies Graf treats their sexual candor in a non-exploitative manner. As she accompanies these young adults through their daily activities--from details of getting in and out of cars and beds, to the social gatherings and the discussion sessions that they themselves have organized--the “subjects” of the film become active participants in its making. Village Voice critic Jim Hoberman, calling Handicapped Love “one of the most extraordinary documentaries of recent years,” adds, “the effect is compellingly unsentimental and, like all good documentaries, profoundly defamiliarizing.” Director Graf notes, “The handicapped experience the difficulties of living together in an extreme form”; her film is an exploration of both the specific nature of their problem and the universality of their experience.