Just got back from BHS. I felt lucky to watch this masterpiece on big screen despite the quality of the tape. What's more special about tonight was that followed by the screening, Stuart Milk, the nephew of Harvey was there to host a Q&A session. Stuart Milk is the president of Milk foundation which does devoted work to support LGBT community internationally.
The time is late 70s and the place is San Francisco. After a short bio of Milk who is originally from Long Island New York, then moves to SF with his partner, the movie shifts its focus onto his campaigns, which made tremendously sense out of the title of the movie ---- the times of Harvey Milk. After three unsuccessful attempts, Milk is elected to the San Francisco Board Supervisors. As the first openly gay man to be elected, it's understandably controversial and considered to be one of the biggest breakthroughs on LGBT right in the history.
I like how this movie isn't all about Harvey Milk's personal life and his tragic ending. But a good chunk of the movie is documenting the changes in the acceptance of homosexuality in the United States. As of one of Milk's biggest accomplishment, together with George Moscone, the defeat of California's Proposition 6 was a huge win and great encouragement to gay people. However, among all the interviewees throughout the entire film, the most intriguing one was Jim Elliot. His words were candid and indicative of working class Americans at the time. He famously said, if he hadn't met Harvey Milk he had no problem with policemen beating gay people and throwing them out of the bar. "What's wrong with that?"
The movie itself is really touching and powerful. It waves through the story of this formidable man's involvement in the political process. I was surprised that it was made in 1984, not that far from the infamous assassination of Milk and Moscone. The movie well captures the mood and moment of the community, the city and the history. The audience tonight was deeply moved when we saw the candlelight vigil on the evening of the tragedy that consisted of thousands of thousands of people marching from Castro to City Hall in San Francisco. There were 5 doctors and 17 lawyers in the march publicly without worrying about being fired from work, all thanks to Milk and his defeat of Prop.6. Nowadays the number seems to be ridiculously trivial, but imagine that was almost 40 years ago when homosexuality was still considered a mental illness let along openly gay people come out to the world and protest on the street.
In the Q&A session, people asked all sorts of question about Harvey Milk himself, like what inspirations or what happened to him that made him became who he was, what kind of support he received internally from the close family etc. Mr.Stuart Milk was definitely one of the finest speakers I've ever seen, he answered those questions with witty analogies and adorable anecdotes between he and his uncle. He said the death of his uncle was the bullet to the "closet door" to him. He came out right after the murder and became a human right activist to carry on his uncle's wish.
"I was 17 when Harvey was killed. He gave me this book when I was twelve. On the first page he wrote 'Your differences are medicine for the world even if the world doesn't know it. The fact that you're different makes it even more important. Never give up'".
