A beautiful biopic

Milk

Genre: Biography

Director: Gus Van Sant

Cast: Sean Penn, Emile Hirsch, Josh Brolin, Diego Luna

Storyline: A biopic of Harvey Milk, the first openly-gay politician in the United States


Bottomline: Sean Penn and Josh Brolin’s excellent performances are the high points on this richly-nuanced celebration of a life less ordinary.

At the outset, it must be said that Milk cannot be enjoyed if one harbours even the slightest of homophobic tendencies. This is the movie that won Sean Penn his second best actor trophy at the Oscars after Mystic River (2003). Watching him as Harvey Milk, the first openly-gay politician in the United States of America, it is not surprising that he took the golden man home. It is not the false nose, the contact lenses or the redone hairline, rather it is the way Penn internalised Milk’s charismatic persona and converted Milk from being a treacly-sweet saint on the altar of gay rights in a largely hagiographic film to a warm, believable person that is remarkable.

The movie starts with a forty-year-old Milk deciding to move with his lover Scott Smith from New York to San Francisco. The two pool their savings and start a camera store, Castro Camera, which soon becomes a magnet for people with alternative lifestyles, principles and sexualities. There are those who oppose the crowd at Castro and all they stand for.

Milk soon takes the plunge into activism and after contesting elections and losing many times, in 1977 is elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Milk is now a canny political animal and bargains with another newly-appointed supervisor, Dan White, for votes on various issues. Milk mobilises opinion against Proposition 6, which is a referendum to allow schools to fire gay teachers. In 1978, White assassinates Milk.

The movie is fascinating for the authentic look and feel of San Francisco. Director Gus Van Sant (Good Will Hunting, Finding Forrester and other not-so-accessible films such as Elephant and Paranoid Park) has shot on location and used footage of the time to heighten the feeling of verisimilitude. What makes Milk stand apart from other lovingly-recreated worshipful biopics is the acting and the tricky take on White.

At one level, Milk works as a treatise on the relationship between the flamboyant Milk and the repressed White. Van Sant seems to suggest that White was fighting his demons and trying to come to terms with his sexuality and in Milk saw a symbol of all he hated and loved and wanted to destroy and cherish. All these conflicting emotions are consummately personified in Josh Brolin’s performance.

Even if you are not tuned into American history and the gay rights movement, Milk is worth a watch for the excellent performances and for a warm and wonderful celebration of the underdog.