Reflections on Milk (1)

Harvey Milk was the first openly Gay man elected to a significant position as a supervisor in San Francisco in the late 70s. That was the era of in-the-streets Gay activism still less than 10 years after the Stonewall Riot in Greenwich Village kicked open a lot of doors. Milk, along with San Francisco mayor Moscone was assassinated by former supervisor Dan White.

That's the plot of this top-quality film, Milk starring Sean Penn as Milk, Josh Brolin as White, James Franco as Milk's lover, and Emile Hirsch as Cleve Jones. But the plot in this case is just a structure on which to build a story. In essence it is a snapshot of the 1970-78 era. In Milk we see the movement's shift from secret sex to open activism. We see the willingness to begin to step outside the Gay community for support and to stand up and be counted. We see what may have been the peak of excitement and frenzy and hope before AIDS came crashing in only a few years later.

The acting is excellent. The story and everything about the movie is Academy Award quality. You will be confronted by the Gay lifestyle. After years of Gay men playing straight (from Rock Hudson to Neal Patrick Harris) here we have straight men playing Gay. Brokeback Mountain got a lot of publicity for its Gay love story. But that was a story that could have been straight or Gay. It was star-struck love. This is a different story. This is about being Gay today, though set in 1978. Current political trends don't look all that different than they did then. It is also about the power of political activism.

But thanks to Harvey Milk and now this movie it is not 1978 we are reminded that the times are different and we can make a difference. More to come on that later in the week, but when you get the chance see this movie.