The Resurrection of Harvey Milk
On the 30th anniversary of his death, and with the new Gus Van Sant biopic bearing his name, Harvey Milk is bigger than ever. As movie audiences nationwide reflect on the man who was, one can't help but wonder about the man who might have been. What if Milk hadn't been murdered?
By Michael Martin
From The Advocate November 8, 2008
http://www.advocate.com/issue_story_ektid63955.asp (http://www.advocate.com/issue_story_ektid63955.asp)
Cleve Jones has a clear memory from the day his mentor was gunned down in San Francisco's City Hall in 1978. "In my heart, I believed the gay rights movement was over," he says. But by the time the sun had set that sorrowful day, "tens of thousands of men, women, and children of every age, race, and background were marching with their candles down Market Street, and I realized the movement wasn't over at all. It was just beginning."
While most people were shocked by news of the assassination, it likely wouldn't have come as a surprise to Harvey Milk. In the last year of his life, the San Francisco supervisor recorded a final testament to be played in the event that he was killed -- an effort at self-preservation that the new movie Milk depicts in several scenes, showing Sean Penn as the politician reciting the events of his life at his kitchen table in the Castro.
The movie is getting good reviews, although NPR did a story on Milk's remembrance in San Francisco and its pretty darn low. It seems the most anything people connect to Harvey Milk's name is the infamous "Twinkie Defense" used by his killer.