Milk (2008/I)

Director: Gus Van Sant

Cast: Sean Penn as Harvey Milk, Emile Hirsch as Cleve Jones, Josh Brolin as Dan White, Diego Luna as Jack Lira, James Franco as Scott Smith, Alison Pill as Anne Kronenberg, Victor Garber as Mayor George Moscone, Denis O'Hare as State Senator John Briggs, Joseph Cross as Dick Pabich, Stephen Spinella as Rick Stokes, Lucas Grabeel as Danny Nicoletta, Brandon Boyce as Jim Rivaldo, Howard Rosenman as David Goodstein, Kelvin Yu as Michael Wong, Jeff Koons as Art Agnos

I never vibrated together with Van Sant, but this time I must say he
convinced me.

The main merit of "Milk" is that it conveys A MORAL PRINCIPLE - in an
extraordinarily powerful, and stylish too, way. Or, as it's also
stated: "What matters is the fight, more than the outcome!" The script,
very dense and well organized, follows the fastidious steps of building
up a message, at the same time respecting the ingrate historic
chronology - the perpetual dilemma of the docudrama. All around this
structure, the direction skilfully grows-up the flesh of the human
content, social layers and ethical matters. It turns out a definite
lesson of movie-making, for all to see and learn.

I should also add that my country, Romania, is just passing through the
historical stage that "Milk" is depicting: pushing homophobia into
obsolescence and reaching normality. As such, initially our rating
commission came with a positively ludicrous decision: banning "Milk"
for the 18- audiences, because (hear this, as a pearl of idiocy!) "It
makes propaganda for a certain sexual orientation!" I gave them a piece
of my mind, in my own review, pointing out that the movie only MAKES
PROPAGANDA FOR MORALS, so it should be recommended to ALL AGES
AUDIENCES, no matter how young! In the end, after an official complain,
they relented and lowered the rating to "not recommended to under-15".
Still silly, but one can't have it all, can we? Thank God, audiences
who don't care about this movie will ignore it, and those who do, will
see it nonetheless. And become better human beings.