Ron Woodroof was an electrician living in Texas who had led an uninhibited life. One day at work in 1986, he fainted and was later diagnosed with AIDS and told by Dr. Saks and Dr. Sevard. that he had only 30 days left to live. Dr. Saks was a caring female doctor, while Dr. Sevard was supportive of pharmaceutical representatives who were launching a drug trial in the hospital for money. Several days later, he went to the hospital looking for cure, however, only to find that the drugs for curing AIDS were either just released for testing only, or yet to be approved by the FDA, that the hospital could not provide him the drug.

Unwilling to succumb to his seemingly final fate, he managed to find a janitor who worked in the hospital where he was admitted to. Having received some benefits, the janitor began to help him steal a kind of drug called ATZ out of the hospital for him to take. However, his symptoms somehow became worse, and the janitor refused to bring him any more drug due to tightened regulations of the hospital. Instead, he gave Ron a note with a Mexican doctor's contact on it. Ron fainted again.

When he was awake in the hospital, he met a homosexual guy called Rayon, who told him that he was on ATZ trial, and even his friend was paying him big money for the drug. Ron could not afford it whatsoever.

It had been 30 days later when he was first sent to the hospital. Driven by desperation, he went to the Mexican Doctor's clinic, where the doctor gave him some medicines which had not been approved by USA. This was where Ron came up with an idea to make a fortune. He began to smuggle the drugs from Mexico to Texas and started his business from AIDS support groups and bars. It was not enough. On the other hand, the condition of the patients participating in the ATZ drug trial became worse. 

One day, Rayon found Ron in his car and managed to persuade him to sell him his drugs. It turned out to be a win-win corporation. Soon they rented a room of a motel for their new business, and distributed free drugs to their members for a membership of $400 monthly only. Ron flew to different places of the world to buy drugs which were not allow to be imported into USA. Little by little, Ron had built a friendship with Rayon, comparing with that he found Rayon and his kind disgusting the first time they met.

One day at the airport when he was back from drug procurement, he fainted in the toilet and became awake in the hospital, where Dr. Sevard woke him up and told him that the FDA confiscated a great deal of his drugs he brought from abroad. Dr. Sevard was furious at Ron's behavior, commanding Dr. Saks to tell her patients to stay away from Ron. However, Ron and Rayon's business was thriving, that a lot of AIDS patients became their members, while more and more AIDS patients were desperate that they asked the FDA to find better solution for treating AIDS as quickly as possible. Ron invited Dr. Saks for a nice dinner and gave her a painting drawn by his mother.

The police showed up at Ron's office with a court order and confiscate all his drugs. It became worse that FDA had introduced new regulations against illegal drugs for AIDS. In general, Ron's business became illegal. Ron exhausted all means to save his hanging-by-a-thread business. Then a couple who were his member offered him a new office free of charge. It was still not enough. Rayon went to his father, but his father refused to offer him any help. He had to sell his life insurance policy, not long before he was admitted to hospital after coughing out a pile of blood. 

Once again when Ron came back to Texas from his business, he found out that Rayon was gone forever. He lost it and accused Dr. Sevard to his face that he was a murderer because of the ATZ he gave his patients. He was so mad at Dr. Saks too. Dr. Saks could not help but yell at Ron that Rayon was her friend too. After she went back home, instead of hanging the Ron's painting on the wall, she smashed the wall and cried helplessly. She made up her mind and asked the nurse to lower the dosage of ATZ to the minimum for all patients. Ron went to a AIDS support group, gave out fliers of his Dallas Buyers Club and told the staff from CDC that they were more of a drug dealer than himself. Dr. Saks told Dr. Sevard that he would have to fire her. 

Ron told Dr. Saks the things he was willing to enjoy in the rest of his life. She went back home and finally hung the painting on the right position.

Ron's health had continued to go into a decline, and he lost his case against FDA. But when he went back to the hospital, he was welcomed by so many people like a true hero. He was a true hero.

Ron died of AIDS on September 12, 1992, 2557 days after he was diagnosed with AIDS. A lower dose of ATZ became widely used to save millions of lives.