Milk

I am amazed by Sean Penn’s performance as Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to win an elected office in the United States. Astonished, really. He embodies in movement, posture and tone Milk’s gayness, frankly and convincingly, in all its tender, raunchy and exuberant moods. Penn’s Milk is a complex and contradictory character, very human and very quirky, basically just like the rest of us if a bit more joyfully and fearlessly over the top.

The film also does a good job of capturing the spirit of the drug-tripping, music-grooving, world-changing, justice-seeking, truth-telling, power-to-the-people 60’s revolution as it spilled over into the daily lives of average people in the 1970’s. Hard to believe that there was a time not so long ago when progressive social change was de rigeur. A lot of old barriers were trashed and swept away during that time, or at least moved aside: sexism, racism, ageism, bias against people with disabilities. Big corporations were actually hauled into court and fined for irresponsible dumping of toxic wastes, prejudicial hiring and lending practices, etc. As crazy and chaotic as it sometimes felt, it was very inspiring to be part of positive change. I felt proud to be an American. This film helps to remind us of the values that seem to have been lost on the long strange trip we’ve been on for the last eight years. That’s another reason to see it.

Milk is a breakthrough film for the gay community, a full-blooded affirmation of the GLBT lifestyle after the more careful genre pioneers Brokeback Mountain and Chuck and Buck. But this is not a breakthrough film for Penn. He’s one of the very few actors in the known world who has not slipped into a bankable and talent squelching stereotype. While many great actors like Al Pacino, Richard Burton and Marlon Brando had magical screen presence, they were always, fundamentally, playing themselves dressed up in different costumes for different eras, with the occasional accent thrown in for better or worse. And that was fine, really, because these actors are just so much fun to watch and their gifts are so large and generous.

But Sean Penn is in another dimension. Somehow, he manages to erase a higher percentage of his celebrity than others, get over his brand and his ego and pour himself into the body, blood and brains of his role. Not an easy thing to do. Of course, many fine actors physically immerse themselves in the world of the character they are going to play. Think of Frank Langella spending hours at Nixon’s home in preparation for his role in Frost/Nixon. Or, a variation on this theme, Robert Deniro gaining 70 pounds to play Jake LaMotta in Martin Scorsese’s Raging Bull. All astonishing stuff, and lucky are we to be able to see these kinds of kinetic performances. But there are, inevitably, some fingerprints of the actor’s trade in the film on even the best of these performances, some endlessly rehearsed professional form or flourish. Not a bad thing, just a flutter of the membrane between real life and acting.

Penn has these set pieces, too, but I don’t mind as much when he ripples the veil of the illusion of the story because his range is so vast and his performances are so heartfelt and compelling. Think about the different roles he’s played recently: Jimmy Markum, a macho ex-con, in Mystic River; Sam Dawson, a mentally retarded man who fight for custody of his 7-year-old daughter, in I Am Sam; Emmet Ray, a Depression era jazz guitarist, in Woody Allen’s Sweet and Low Down.

Hard to imagine where he goes from here. There’s a rumor he’s playing the role of Larry Fine in a 2009 release of The Three Stooges! There are times in history when wise men must play the fool.