Review: Penn's 'Milk' Touching, Inspiring

Sean Penn may play the hero in "Milk," but what elevates the film beyond the boundaries of a standard biopic is that he is only one in a band of heroes -- merely the public ringleader of a social movement that was about far more than just one man.

"Milk" is a celebration of a wider community that's living through a nightmare but still daring to dream, and unlike so many other biographies that zoom in on only one personality, "Milk" keeps looking around, taking stock of the way in which one man affected the lives of real people.

We start the film in 1970 and make our way through to 1978 -- hardly the "life story" that some might be expecting. But by narrowing the film's focus, director Gus Van Sant is allowed to dig deeper into the defining days of one gay man and the cultural turf war being waged that decade in America (and still today, with the likes of California's Proposition 8 and the Florida court rulings from this week). It's in '78 that we meet a rattled Harvey Milk, who, shortly before his death, sits down to record an oral history, trying to preserve something of himself in the event that he is assassinated.

Jumping eight years into the past and 3,000 miles to the east, we see Milk on the streets of New York City. It's the day before his 40th birthday, and after flirting and spending the night with a much younger Scott Smith (James Franco), Milk reveals to his new fling that he's a pretty bored guy.

Working a white-collar job, hiding the truth about his sexuality from his family, always nervous about how strangers might view his relationships -- Milk is a man who feels woefully out of synch with the world. He's fed up and tells Scott that he needs a change, and Scott nudges him to make a move.

So together they abandon New York for San Francisco, and rediscover themselves in the Castro district, a community of gay citizens. They open up a store selling cameras, and within the first few days find themselves simultaneously embraced by an underground gay community and yet shunned by the local business association. One business owner goes so far as to tell them that their kind isn't welcome here. For Milk, it's a confusing one-two punch, that homophobia could exist side-by-side with gay customers, and so he devises a purely capitalist response: He organizes his own business association, of gay-friendly businesses.

At first, it's a secret, but powerful underground network. Effectively, those San Francisco shops that are friendly to the gay community are flooded with business; those that express disdain quickly go out of business. Milk makes a point of telling people where to shop, and soon enough business owners start to take notice. In one notable episode, when union labor tries to organize a boycott against Coors Beer, Milk and his comrades are only so kind to oblige. And as Coors gets pushed out of San Francisco, gay members start to sign up with the local Teamsters union.

It's this business network that becomes a political network, when Milk becomes fed up with the fact that not one city politician is advocating for gay issues. He sets his sights on the position of City Supervisor, and orchestrating one failed campaign after another, he slowly makes a name for himself in the city. He learns how to put on a suit and tie, how to influence the media, how to reach out to others for help in organizing, and how to court not just the gay vote but the heterosexual vote as well.

As he sets off on the campaign trail, we don't see Milk so much as an activist -- though he is a grassroots hero of sorts -- but a man on the fringe who so adheres to ideals of this country that he believes the maretkplace, and the ballot booth, will get him where he needs to be.

Losing time and again, he perfects his ground game, and picks up friends and allies along the way. Cleve Jones (Emile Hirsch) is a local, jaded, apathetic teenager who Milk convinces to care enough about his lot in life to participate in the political process. Jack Lira (Diego Luna) is so captivated by Milk's passion for change that he becomes the politician's new lover, after Scott flees the stress of the campaign trail.

When Milk finally wins office -- becoming the first openly-elected gay official in America -- he even finds a friend in the newly-elected Dan White (Josh Brolin), the supervisor from a far more conservative area of town. But as Milk thrives in office, becoming a national leader of sorts for the gay rights movement, White flounders in obscurity, growing increasingly bitter towards his colleague.

"Milk" is the story of a man, yes, and a powerful political movement. But director Gus Van Sant sprinkles in enough emotional asides to help us understand the emotional trauma involved in the issue. For those it affects, gay rights legislation amounts to a willingness to see them as viable members of the society. In more than one scene, Milk reaches out to gay teens who have been unable to reveal themselves to their families, or who have been abandoned by those they love.

Milk recalls how some of his past lovers have attempted to commit suicide, convinced that they are evil. It's a way of life, in the Castro, to realize that the cops are not on your side, and that occasional street side beatings and killings can occur at any time. When it comes to fighting a California law that will ban gay teachers from public schools, Milk becomes adamant in his belief, that if homosexuality remains a secretive affair, then the persecution will never stop. He encourages all those who have worked on his campaign to come out to their parents -- to help the world realize that gay people are not monsters lurking in the shadows, but are living in secret in every community across the nation.

These are bigger themes than that of one man's ascension up the political ranks, and it's Van Sant's willingness to underscore Milk's tale with the story of the wider gay movement that makes "Milk" mesmerizing. Penn is charismatic and uplifting as the hardworking, unwavering ever-optimistic and always-unstoppable Milk.

But he is hardly alone in breathing life into these scenes. The film features stellar performances from Hirsch, Franco, and a dozen others. Brolin, in particular, brings complexity and depth to White (Milk's assassin), someone who so easily could have been dismissed as a monster.

It's a collective effort, and it brings to life not just a single personality, or a single political issue, but the coming together of a community in a defining time. It's a lesson in history, yes, but more importantly a lesson in grassroots organizing and the "can do" American spirit. It's a touching movie and, more than that, an inspiring call to action.

In only eight years, the 40-something Milk changed the world. It's enough to leave anyone wanting to fight for what they believe in.