MILK It.
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Proposition 8 Protest Rally & Street Closures – Wednesday, November 5th
As deeply disappointed as we all are that California voters passed Proposition 8, we must not allow that disappointment to linger. This vote is a temporary defeat in the long march toward equal rights for all citizens in America.
Please join me for a protest rally tonight at 7 pm on San Vicente Blvd between West Hollywood Park and the Pacific Design Center (647 N. San Vicente Blvd. West Hollywood CA 90069) as we move forward towards restoring equality for all in California.
San Vicente Blvd, between Santa Monica Blvd and Melrose Avenue will be closed tonight starting at 6 pm. San Vicente south-bound traffic will be directed to make left or right at Santa Monica Blvd. Signs have already been posted to help divert traffic.
For more information about tonight’s rally, please contact (323) 848-6460.
So what does this have to do with movies? (Yes, that is now the primary focus of this blog again)
Milk, however overstated by The Hollywood Reporter last week, has been trying to stay clear of the election cycle, as have movies like Frost/Nixon, Twilight, and even James Bond. The two political movies in this group were clearly concerned about mixing fact and fiction, even though both these films are based on the true stories. But getting heard above the noise of the election is very challenging. Twilight and Bond have both worked their bases effectively. But the big ad money is just rolling out now. And indeed, Milk is a case where the movie is opening in three weeks and change, is presumably more review driven than many films, and wants to keep the wave from breaking so early that there would be no froth three weeks from Friday.
But the moment is the moment. And the success of the anti-gay-marriage Prop 8 in California is, stunningly, a mirror reflection of one of the central stories of Harvey Milk
This is one of those cases where life imitates art imitates life.
I personally put Milk in the same category as MLK, Chavez, the Steinem/Friedan block of early new feminists: people who, for one reason or another, found themselves as symbols of groups fighting for rights and change. In the aftermath of this election, which for all its hopefulness and positivity reminds us there is still work to be done, drawing this parallel seems only fitting.
And Focus SHOULD take advantage. “Milk” was never going to be an ultra-commercial sell, so any uplifting way to spread the message and draw attention needs to be seized on.
I think there’s a lot of national anger over one state’s issue and agree with David: Focus should ride that wave even though it’s the least-fortunate reason to be on the board.
After all, there are those who are upset about Prop 8’s win who might not know the specifics of Harvey Milk’s story. But, they have the ability to put two and two together, as should Focus – diplomatically and carefully – with its marketing efforts.
Thanks for reading In Contention, David.
I dunno. I was wondering the same thing this morning; how the tragic outcome of Proposition 8 affects Milk, and I don’t think it helps the film. I distinctly remember watching Hairspray in July, 2007 and feeling a bitter after taste over the fact that the Supreme Court had just partially invalidated the school integration policies of several states. I still loved the movie, but it wasn’t quite as inspiring knowing what just happened in present day DC.
And, frankly, it’ll be more than unpleasant watching a biopic of Harvey Milk knowing that his legacy has been partially undone in one bold stroke. Gross simplifications, I know, but I certainly don’t think it’ll help the film’s Oscar chances. Just as Fahrenheit 911 was dead in the water the second that Bush won re-election, I can’t realistically imagine seeing Sean Penn giving an Oscar acceptance speech in California, the very state that just more or less pissed on Harvey Milk’s ideology. Just my thoughts. Oscar doesn’t like to celebrate failure.
No, but Oscar voters do like to make political statements, and Milk offers them a prime opportunity to do so.
BROLIN = OWNAGE.
This movie is going to rule.
As usual, cryptic, Kris. ???
Just mirroring one of your anti-Nikki quips from a while back is all……
Well, if Milk wins any Oscar at all I hope whoever gets up there can make a big ol’ fashioned fuss and talk over the orchestra. The Oscars need something like that. All the better if it’s someone like Penn, but that’s not going to happen.
Of course, most people who would have voted yes on prop 8 aren’t the kind of people to watch the Oscars, I presume. It also means that, probably, a lot of people who voted for Obama voted yes on Prop 8 and it’s like taking one step forward and one step back.
Kris… don’t turn into Wells. You seem to be going down that road. And you have decades of bitterness due you before you go there.
Low blow.
Low or not, it isn’t remotely applicable.
You seem anxious to sling mud and to defend imagined turf these days, Kris. That suggests the kind of insecurity that, though many years of building up rageful pain, has put Jeff where he is today. It is applicable, though I surely hope you will not fall into it. I think it is probably time for you to do what you seem to want to do and to move into real journalism for a while. All these petty Oscar turf wars seem to chafe with you more than not.
In any case, I just saw an entry by Anne Thompson that suggests that you suggested that Milk could have turned Prop 8 somehow. My conversations with people who had a vested interest in Prop 8 was what I was speaking to… if that issue is what you were referring to.
I don’t think that what any movie writer wrote would have stirred me to reference the notion that the film could have had politcal value. But had I read your comment before I started writing my piece at 10:30 this morning, I likely would have refered to your comment directly.
I am not shy about offering credit to others.
It’s hardly an insight that’s exclusive to you, Kris. We were all at that same MILK screening, and this conversation started in the lobby between a number of people. It’s impossible to see MILK and be in California and NOT connect it to Prop 8.
Hell, why don’t you thank Devin Faraci, who wrote about this the day after that screening, if you’re determined to source the thought to the first person who printed it?
Actually… I wrote the following the Wednesday before the screening…
“If California’s Prop 8 passes (eliminating gay marriage), Milk becomes very hot in a hurry because it is about a gay political martyr (of sorts), along with Doubt, which is about raging zealotry.”
But as you say, Drew, “first” is a silly fight here. I know that I have been talking about the election(s) and how they will affect these films since the summer… and I am surely not alone.
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