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Milk represents a return to the mainstream for director Gus Van Sant, who made the likes of To Die For and Good Will Hunting before transitioning into defiantly indie territory with such films as (the Palme d'Or-winning) Elephant and Paranoid Park. Although "mainstream" can be construed as a dirty word amongst critical circles, it needn't necessarily be so. Despite the relatively high profile - and Oscar-nomination-attracting - nature of his latest outing, it is still a heartfelt film of true quality and no little artistic endeavour. Milk dramatises the later life of Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man elected to public office in America, and so the story seems a personal and relevant one for the director to tackle. Van Sant himself, like Milk, only "came out" in middle age, so the personal resonances are clear to see, and the issues that Milk fought for are still hotly contested (as recently as November 2008, California voted for "Proposition 8", which banned gay marriages). He was shot dead by a former colleague in 1978.
Milk begins with a non-linear sequence that cuts between archival footage (which is used extensively throughout the film, to great effect) of gay rights-related troubles, newsreel material from Milk's death, and Harvey Milk (Sean Penn) himself recording a tape message that he requests only be listened to in the event of his assassination. His recorded statement forms a narration of sorts for the film. Beginning the day before Milk's 40th birthday in 1970, around the time he first moved to San Francisco and began the Castro Street gay community there, the film spans the last eight years of his life. To a degree it follows the traditional biopic template (rise-fall-resurgence) which results in the middle section, as in many examples of the genre, feeling rather elongated and repetitive, but both the earlier and later sections are compelling.
Sean Penn, with his history of angry testosterone-fuelled characters as well as his own public image, would perhaps seem an unlikely candidate to play an open homosexual, but he delivers the role with great conviction and restraint (no over-the-top histrionics here, as Penn has been accused of, rightly or wrongly, in the past). In fact the whole ensemble excels: James Franco, after his film-stealing turn in Pineapple Express continues to show heretofore untapped acting talents, while Josh Brolin, as politician-turned-assassin Dan White, is chilling and utterly believable. The success of the film is proven by the time the inevitable end arrives and reveals a real attachment to these characters that is extremely moving.
The summary
An accomplished biopic of a man who is perhaps, until now, not as widely known as he should be. An important subject, well handled.
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