Review of MILK BY Jessica Zafra www.jessicarulestheuniverse.com The events described in Milk seem like records from a distant era, so it’s startling to realize that they happened just 30 years ago. Movies based on the lives of public figures tend to play like history lessons—you keep glancing at your watch to see how much more edification you must endure—but Gus Van Sant has crafted a vital and compelling piece of cinema. Based on the life of the assassinated gay rights activist turned San Francisco supervisor, Milk is the story of how one citizen becomes involved in the political life of a nation. Harvey, a New York-born insurance company employee, moves to San Francisco with his boyfriend and opens a camera shop on the Castro. It’s the early Seventies: a gay man risks losing his job if he is exposed. He soon finds that San Francisco is not as tolerant as he’d hoped, and the Christian right is waging war on anyone who disagrees with them. Harvey quickly marshals the power of numbers, ...