Susan's Place Transgender Resources

Has anyone seen "Milk"? What did you think?

Hypatia and I saw it. I was a little girl when it all happened, but I had never heard of him. I thought the movie was great. Sean Penn did a wonderful job. And when the showed the pictures of the real people at the end, I was very impressed with the casting. All the actors looked just like the people they portrayed. I highly recommend seeing it.

Yes... sometimes when you see a movie, you know it isn't just another movie... it's something great and moving and you feel caught up in a wave of excellence, a sense that life can be so much more... Milk is powerfully inspiring and gave needed heart to our LGBT community at a difficult moment in our history. The scene of crowds massing with candles at the end is so powerful, you feel like you want to jump right into the screen and take part. Another part that really moved me was the gay teenager who was isolated in some homophobic family and reached out for help with a desperate phone call, and finally liberated himself. This touches the real life suffering and liberation of so many people, so immediately.

Me and a lot of guys I know are in it.  Where do you think they get those crowds?  Crowds R Us?  So I know a lot of people who were 'gay for pay for a day' as we called it.  So we did the set up (I'm not a real movie person, I'm a rock person, so I pulled cables all over Castro Street and Civic Center), then went over and got my extra card and made another $90 per day (and food, lots of food) standing around and yelling.

What was funny was a lot of us were re-enacting scenes we were at (the first Gay Liberation Parades, and the 'White Night' riot) in the first place.

That Sean Penn is a good actor is not a problem, and stories are telescoped in movies and most people know that, but the real Dan White was not as homophobic as the movie made him out to be.  DW supported many of HMs proposals, and had other major problems, not just an anti-gay deal.  Remember that HM was not the target, that was the mayor, George Moscone, HM was just a bonus almost. The entire event was very sad.  But like many sad events, it made a hell of a movie.

I wish they would have rolled film between the takes because Penn would get up and start to lecture/speachify in the manner of Milk and did a great job talking against the war, Bush and the rest.

I loved the movie so much. :) I saw it with a bunch of friends, all of us at varying levels between straight and gay, but all of us were pretty close to tears at the end.  It was so beautiful.

James Franco goes to my college! :D

I LOVED IT.  It was stunning and ...I'm pretty speechless.  I can't put it into words.  And I'm SO GLAD that Sean Penn got the Oscar for it...and the screenplay(? I think).  The whole experience was amazing.

On a side note, I didn't really see Dan White being portrayed as homophobic in the movie.   :-\  He was a little pathetic, but...yeah. 

We rented the DVD earlier this month. Absolutely loved it! Very moving. We even watched all the extras. I'm a longtime fan of Harvey Milk, years ago I read the biography Mayor of Castro Street by Randy Shiltz, and also saw the documentary about him of the same name.

We even named our previous cat Harvey after Harvey Milk  ;D

Z

I just saw it today and was very moved. Having seen the documentary before hand, I feel they hit a lot of important parts, but really there's a lot of interesting stuff in his career they didn't have time for.

I was really able to relate to the kid in the wheelchair though, my area is generally accepting, but to find real community of any sort, heading to a major city is the only real option.

Tekla
That must have been heaps of fun. I was in a commercial once in male mode. I was cooking sausages outside a petrol station, in the commercial. After each take we had to get rid of the sausages and re cook for the next. A 90 sec commercial took one load of sausages ;D.

Couldn't eat a sausage for weeks!

Haven't seen the movie as yet

LoL
Cindy James

It was, people who say 'there is no such thing as a free lunch' have never been around craft services in the movies.  The coolest thing was working to make the Castro and Civic Center Plaza look like they did in the 1970s.  When they trucked in all the period cars and parked them it was a strange rush. That and we all made $90 bucks a day.  Alas I didn't look 'gay enough, circa 1975' so I was placed in the back of the crowd.

Just saw it last weekend with my girlfriend. I wasn't aware of the extent of what Harvey Milk had achieved and my gf hadn't heard of him at all. We both really enjoyed the movie.

Dennis

Well, it finally made it to cable.  Julie & I watched it tonight on HBO.  We both were very moved and, yes, there were some watery eyes at the end, especially as the camera panned back to show the crowded streets filled with candle holding mourners.

What was surprising is that 30 years later, a lot of what we're fighting today, they were fighting back then, like the majority voting away the rights of the minority.  It was as if we had only moved inches.

And there was the equating gay to bestiality and pedophilia.  Sounds a lot like what we hear from the christian right today, only now transgender is included in the fear and hate mongering.

However, what was most amazing was all that Harvey Milk accomplished in the short span of only eight years, from 40 to 48 years old.  It shows you how much we can accomplish if we don't give up or lose hope.  And Harvey Milk was filled with hope.

Julie

I haven't seen it yet but I want to. I'm glad to hear you all enjoyed and appreciated it.

I finally saw it a couple of weeks ago.  And I remember when all that was going on.  It was nice to see what happened and how it compared with what I heard.  And I remember hearing about the assassinations.



Hugs and Love
Janet