BEFORE: The spotlight falls on Sean Penn this week - displaying his acting range from a drug-dealer, to a math professor/transplant recipient, to a gay politician.
THE PLOT: The story of Harvey Milk, and his struggles as an activist who fought for gay rights and became California's first openly gay elected official.
AFTER: Penn got his second Best Actor Oscar for this film, narrowly (?) edging out Mickey Rourke's performance from "The Wrestler". I've now seen both films, and I understand why the race was so tight - but I still don't know if the right man won. Rourke's performance was certainly more action-packed, and more visually interesting - there's only so much excitement you can get from watching a man propose city ordinances and dictate his life story into a tape recorder.
With the depiction of the civil rights issues in this film, it's obviously easy to draw parallels to the current controversies over gay marriage. People who oppose gay rights do so in the name of their religion or morality, but how moral is it to discriminate and oppress other people? I'm far from an expert on these issues, so in a way I feel somewhat disconnected from this film - but I know bigotry and oppression when I see it.
I vaguely remember the 70's movement led by Anita Bryant, and later the "Moral Majority" of the 1980's. But saying that all gays are perverts is like saying that all Muslims are terrorists...it's a convenient way to pigeonhole people, to further an agenda. In fact, I also see similarities to the controversy over the proposed mosque near Ground Zero. I see the irony in people who don't like the oppressive policies of the Taliban blocking the mosque, because in doing so they are trying to curtail civil rights, which is a very Taliban-like thing to do. So congratulations, you just became the exact type of person you yourself disapprove of.
I keep waiting for the religious right and the conservative party to collapse under the weight of their own arrogance - every time a Jimmy Swaggart or a Jim Bakker or a Larry Craig (or Mark Foley or Ted Haggard...do I need to keep going?) is revealed to be the type of "sinner" they condemn, I think, this is it! The conservatives and Big Religion are finally going to be revealed as a big bunch of hypocrites! But these revelations are seen as one-offs, and no one seems to be looking at the big picture. I guess I'm like the Harvey Milk of agnostics - I want to recruit more people to my form of non-religion through logical arguments. Quick joke: How many Republican policitians can you fit in the closet? Apparently, all of them.
What the film really becomes is a vehicle for Penn's acting, which really takes off when Milk faces off against fellow city supervisor Dan White, played by Josh Brolin (last seen in "American Gangster"). The movie falls just shy of getting into White's head, suggesting that he himself might be a closeted gay man, but also suggesting that he had a grudge against Harvey Milk merely due to the politics of, well, politics.
And remember, kids, always load up on sugary junk food before committing a crime - hey, if the "Twinkie Defense" worked for Dan White, then all bets are off.
Do I need to worry about spoilers with this one? Is there anyone who goes into this film not knowing what happens at the end? The scenes of Harvey's own dictations seem to indicate that he knows how it all might end for him...there are similarities to the final scenes of last night's film, and also both films messed around with the linear timeline, since Harvey's dictated remembrances take place out of context, logically set after most of the events depicted, and before his death.
Also starring James Franco (last seen in "Pineapple Express"), Emile Hirsch, Diego Luna (last seen in "Criminal"), Victor Garber, Dennis O'Hare (3rd time this week!) and Joseph Cross (though I thought that was Shawn or Aaron Ashmore)
RATING: 5 out of 10 ballot boxes
The Creative Screenwriting podcast had a great interview with the writer. I think he explained that he didn't want to accidentally make Dan White look sympathetic in any way.
ReplyDelete(That's one reason why the events on the day of the shooting were presented so methodically: White's defense painted a picture of a guy who wasn't in control of his actions, while his actions paint a picture of a guy who planned to do exactly what he did.)
I saw both movies in theaters. I think that the right actor won. I might have been suckered by the distance between Harvey Milk and the other roles Penn has played. I find it hard to believe that Mickey Roarke had a lot of trouble relating to a character who was a huge star back in the 80's but who had been paddling around on the fringes of his profession during the decades since...
Plus, Mickey Rourke (note: not Roarke) was an actual boxer for a while. So playing someone who regularly got his face pounded in might have been perceived as not that much of a stretch. As opposed to Penn playing a gay homosexual - I don't think his characterization relied too heavily on the gay effeminate stereotype, but again, I'm not that qualified to make the call. That's an essay question for another day. James Franco certainly didn't go out of his way to "act gay", he just acted.
ReplyDeleteIt's dangerous territory, that's all I'm sayin'.