The centre piece of Gus Van Sant’s film Milk, is Harvey Milk himself; A forty year old gay man passionate about changing how his fellow citizens see his “people”, but at the same time unsatisfied with his current existence. Seizing the moment, Milk moves to San Francisco with his partner and sets up a camera shop. Seeing the place of his work and residence, Castro Street, become a growing hub for the gay community, as well as witnessing his friends beaten and killed whilst being ignored by the local police because of their lifestyle, Milk decides to try to make a difference. Eventually he and his team, along with the help of the community to which he finds himself the principal voice, create enough noise to have him elected into public office. As Harvey’s influence grows, so does disgust and confusion towards homosexuals in the San Francisco district and beyond.The biopic of late has had a bit of resurgence thanks in part to the commercial success of films such as Ray, Walk the Line and The Aviator. All were decent films, but strictly on a mainstream appeal. The story of a celebrated gay rights activist’s last eight years alive is one that does not strike you as having as much conventional mainstream attraction, confirmed by it being very political in its chronicle and choosing not too show our central protagonist’s younger years for example. In the hands of curious, yet accomplished director Gus Van Sant however, the finished product, which resembles less a biopic of one man, than an account of a moment in time, is a film delivered in a way that it can be embraced by the broader audience, whilst retaining a bit of the director’s natural quirk.
To say Sean Penn inhabits the central role of Harvey Milk could almost be an understatement. The hardened performing veteran, with help from selective prosthetics, evolves into the personality with such ease and grace, you wouldn’t believe he was the same man behind a character such as the intimidating Jimmy Markum from 2003‘s Mystic River. Emile Hirsch and James Franco deserve mention for their equally passionate turns, but it is Josh Brolin as Milk’s political contemporary and eventual enemy, Dan White, who shines the most in the supporting roles. His portrayal is both subtle and unhinged. Plus it is an achievement provoking empathy over demonising someone who would be best described as ’the bad guy’ in a film.
Unique visual and sound editing helps the film greatly, giving it distinctive structure as we jump between Harvey documenting his thoughts on a tape recorder, to the actual events of the time. This device also helps distance Milk from being just another biopic. While it is still immensely watch able, the film is not without it‘s flaws. To be fair though, most of the concerns are unavoidable when working in such a genre, and being political by nature, Dustin Lance Black’s Oscar nominated screenplay still avoids getting bogged down with such jargon, allowing the emotion to filter in - although perhaps not enough to wholly satisfy. Overall, bringing such an important man and moment to life in what is seen as a medium more focused on entertaining than reporting, the combination of director, screenwriter and actor have given us the best we could have hoped for. 
It is clear Mickey Rourke has drawn on the parallels between his real-life erratic career and Randy’s. No doubt it has helped the performance, and it’s a tribute to our director for pushing the actor to dig deep. The reward is a fascinating, hugely immersive journey regardless of Ram’s motives, outcomes or choices. Evan Rachael-Wood and Marisa Tomei complete the roles of Randy’s estranged daughter and aging stripper cum-love interest respectively. Both shine in their emotional responsibility, but Tomei’s Cassidy, whose story mirrors Randy’s in many ways, is finely convincing.
Exploring a relatively uncharted world in cinema, scriptwriter Robert D. Siegel gives us material that on the surface does resemble a clichéd story, but praise must be given to the eye for detail towards the underground wrestling circuit he demonstrates. It effectively kills any chance of formula pulling us out of Randy’s psyche of frustration and eventual acceptance of what he believes his life to amount too. Struggling to complete any relationship he has besides the ones he shares with his loyal fans, it’s seeing Randy risking his life trying to hold on to that what makes him feel human the most, which is genuinely heart-breaking. It's also what make The Wrestler an unmissable film.
Bill Pullman and Freddy Rodriquez add some convincing dramatic weight to their roles of stubborn father to Chris Pine’s Bo and Mexican cellar rat with wine making ambitions of his own respectively, but they’re never given really too much to work with. Pine is fine enough as our lead who needs to pull his attitude, but the surfer-hippy wig he dons was borderline overly distracting to be honest. Rachael Taylor’s character of Sam is performed well enough I suppose, but it would probably help if I felt she needed to be there at all. The love triangle between her, Bo and Rodriquez’s Gustavo is clearly the films weakest link. As expected, Rickman is playing to type, but he is so much fun, every scene he is in is the film’s highlights, particularly ones involving him and a slightly eccentric Dennis Farina.
I recoiled initially from the chosen narrative, of the journal being read by Daisy’s daughter to her on her deathbed. Beside the fact that this device brings unwanted comparisons to the vastly inferior, Forest Gump (note the same screenwriter here), a cut back to Daisy’s hospital room in present day, too rue or explain her regret about a certain situation, started to grow slightly tedious and almost into muddy cliché. Luckily Fincher pulls back before it becomes a nuisance or overly sentimental. It’s a close call, and I perhaps would rather have just seen the story unfold without it. 
It’s almost as if people were saying this before they even saw it, but the now clichéd, “nothing much happens in The Happening” comment is not that far from the truth - but as always with Shyamalan, there is something that makes his films unique, and much like I did in the superior, but widely unpopular, The Village, I almost found it in this one too. The hype machine certainly didn’t work in this film's favour, though. Building such a film up the way they did, and then have not much really materialize is bound to bring calls of “worst film ever” from the sadist IMDB crowd after all.
The horror is done pretty well overall too, and certain scenes that include the various ways people kill themselves, are effective and dripping with intensity without being overly blood splattered or corny. This is the film’s strength because as it goes on, it becomes clearer that our main characters don’t really have much to do besides run from the wind. That might sound peculiar and tedious, but Night has some old school style and he paints a bright looking film that takes advantages of using more of the actor’s physical emotions with some slightly startling (at first) framing. Zooey Daschanel (playing Elliott‘s estranged wife) and Mark Wahlberg (who plays our hero science teacher, Elliott) are fine despite not really getting to develop much given all the running away they do. I won’t deny it though, there are some moments of cringe worthy deliveries, and perhaps Wahlberg just wasn’t the right guy for the role. I like him, but there’s no argument here that the guy is a wooden performer. But, and besides a few disasters bit player wise, the acting overall is not as bad as some reviews have made it out to be.
It is a shame that M.Night Shyamalan painted himself into a bit of a corner early in his career, because the guy does have some talent. But by sticking to the same formula for so long and making the audience pin his film(s) on some big reveal he’s spent the whole movie laying out has alienated a lot of people - at least it did after refusing to drop the gimmick before it became overly predictable anyway. That has made him fairly unique however, because the expectations, both good and bad, heaped upon every new film he announces (still even after all these years) are heavier than most major genre directors, and in most cases, both extremes are never met. Yes, I am happy to give examples too.
The big question is though, was his breakthrough film, The Sixth Sense, that good anyway? If you believed the critics, he was the second coming of both Spielberg and Hitchcock. While it was interesting and original, it hardly has replay value. Perhaps the man, who arguably set the re-invention in motion of ‘the twist’ in mainstream cinema, gets a bit too much attention then. Shouldn’t we just drop the bar for the little guy already? It could be people ripping him to shreds or tripping over themselves in overstated praise, but the bottom line is, he is only a genre director with "Hitchcockian" ambitions, so why can’t he just make films without such scrutiny? Being egotistic is not enough to justify it, because there are HEAPS of egotistical filmmakers in Hollywood who don't cop it as much.