Basic Film Information

• Release Date: November 26, 2008
• Director: Gus Van Sant
• Writer: Dustin Lance Black
• Actors: Sean Penn, Emile Hirsch, Josh Brolin, Diego Luna, Alison Pill, Victor Garber, Denis O’Hare, Joseph Cross, James Franco

Synopsis

Milk is the story of Harvey Milk as he moves from New York to San Francisco where he transforms the area into a place for LGBT people, and becomes the first openly gay man elected to notable public office. The movie follows his life to his assassination in 1978 by a former co-worker.

Contemporary Reviews

• Rotten Tomatoes gives Milk a 94% on the “Tomatometer” and the audience consensus is an 89%
• In the Chicago Reader, JR Jones gives a review highlighting the main selling points of the movie, and praises the telling of the story of Harvey Milk

Background and Interesting Facts

• Sean Penn’s cosmetic transformation in the film included a prosthetic nose and teeth, contact lenses and a redesigned hairline. His makeup was done by Academy Award winner Stephan Dupuis.
• The filming location for Harvey Milk’s business, Castro Camera, was the real storefront where the actual business had once been. At the time of filming (mid-2008), it was a gift shop called “Given”; the film crew worked with the owner of the gift shop to recreate the look of Milk’s camera store inside the space and restored it to its 2008 appearance after filming.
• The apartment that was used in the film is the real apartment Harvey Milk lived in on the Lower Haight in San Francisco.

Critical Analysis

Milk, focused around the life of Harvey Milk and the work that he did in the LGBT community, was a film that tied the work of activists today to the activists of yesterday. In 2008, the LGBT community was one that was fighting the same battles that they were in 1970 and continue to fight today. This movie was topical to the time that it was created in, and really meant to serve as a piece that used history to call out the injustices that are still faced today.

One important battle that Milk fought was trying to create a safe space for gay men in San Francisco. In doing this, he created a tight knit community of people who found a place that they could be accepted, but they were not safe from danger. Men wore whistles around their necks at all time to make sure that they could call for help and others would rush to help them. Even today, the LGBT community is not safe. In the summer of 2016, there was a mass shooting that targeted a gay night club and killed dozens of LGBT people. This issue, by connecting it to history displays how little change there has been in terms of safety.

Another battle that Harvey Milk faced was getting elected to a public office. Milk felt that if there were gay people in his city, they should have their interests heard. In order for him and his friends to receive help in the world was by being a part of what makes it. It was not popular to vote for an openly gay man, and it proved dangerous to be such a notable gay man, receiving several threats on his life through the process. Although it is less dangerous now for LGBT people to run for public office, there are still not many openly gay people holding higher positions of power. Again, there is not much juxtaposition between the scene painted in the 1970s and today.

There were issues brought up about housing and job discrimination due to sexual orientation. In the movie, there were laws brought up around the country that proposed to refuse certain rights to people. These laws are also not a thing of the past. Many states in America still do not have equal protection for LGBT people. Marriage inequality may be a thing of the past, but if a person chose to exercise that right in certain states, might still find themselves out of a job because of it. This movie focuses heavily on the housing and job issue to bring up the fact that it was still a big problem in 2008. Today it is still an issue as well, and this movie still rings true to a lot of people.

To combat these initiatives, the gay community was encouraged to be more transparent. Milk felt that if people were able to be themselves and come out of the closet, more people would see these people that they know and have a change of heart. It is easy to hate something that you cannot see, but once someone has a personal connection, they understand it on a more personal level. Today that is a strategy that also has not really changed. The LGBT community still works to build communities and organize to become more visible in new places. In media is where LGBT representation efforts has been focused the last few years, and by comparing historical methods of visibility efforts to what has been happening today really connects the strife and sense of community that rises from that.

This movie strives to increase gay representation in the media as well as create connections to the gay rights movement of the last 30-40 years. By reflecting on the past, we are better able to move forward. When things are presented in movies especially, it helps people listen and comprehend what has happened in the past, and how it informs the future. Ignorance is something that creates a lot of harm to the LGBT community, and the way this movie chose to combat ignorance was to educate using history and parallels to today. For this reason, this movie has been influential in continuing to push forward LGBT rights in America.

Bibliography

A. O. Scott. “Freedom Fighter in Life Becomes Potent Symbol in Death.” Review of Milk, by Gus Van Sant. New York Times, 26 November 2008.

IMDb. Milk (2008). 2016. Web Article. 19 November 2016.

Rotten Tomatoes- Fandango. Milk (2008). 2016. Web Article. 19 November 2016.