FAQ for
Milk (2008/I) More at IMDbPro »

The following FAQ entries may contain spoilers. Only the biggest ones (if any) will be covered with spoiler tags. Spoiler tags have been used sparingly in order to make the page more readable.

For detailed information about the amounts and types of (a) sex and nudity, (b) violence and gore, (c) profanity, (d) alcohol, drugs, and smoking, and (e) frightening and intense scenes in this movie, consult the IMDb Parents Guide for this movie. The Parents Guide for Milk can be found here.

Harvey Milk was a gay activist elected to public office in California in 1977 as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. He was assassinated a year later by Dan White, a former San Francisco supervisor. Milk was the first openly gay person elected to major office in the US, and has become an important figure in gay history.

No, Milk -- an original script by Dustin Lance Black, based upon new interviews with Harvey Milk's surviving friends and associates -- focuses on the effect of New York transplant Harvey Milk's entry into San Francisco politics upon the final eight years of his private life. Because much of the film's action concerns interaction between people who now are dead, much of Milk is speculative fiction based upon fact. A rival film production based upon the late Mr Shilts' comprehensive non-fiction book (in and out of development since the early 1990s - at first with Mr Van Sant signed to write and direct) was derailed by the WGA strike. See here for more information.

From 1970 (his meeting Scott Smith in NYC) to the candlelight vigil two days after his assassination in San Francisco in 1978.

The use of the "Twinkie Defense" during the trial is an Urban Legend-- Paul Krassner (founder of the Yippie Party, editor of The Realist, member of Ken Kesey's Merry Pranksters, protégé of Lenny Bruce, early contributor to Mad magazine) is given credit for having coined the phrase in 1979 as he reported on the trial for the San Francisco Bay Guardian

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-krassner/behind-the-infamous-twink_b_148474.html

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"...[Josh Getlin, New York bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times] also wrote that White's attorneys "sold the jury on a diminished capacity defense, the now-famous 'Twinkie' defense..." However, this was a purely accidental tactic. Dale Metcalf, a former member of Ken Kesey's Merry Pranksters who had become a lawyer, told me how he happened to be playing chess with Steven Scheer, a member of White's legal team.

Metcalf had just read Orthomolecular Nutrition by Abram Hoffer. He questioned Scherr about White's diet and learned that, while under stress, White would consume candy bars and soft drinks. Metcalf recommended the book to Scherr, suggesting the author as an expert witness. For, in his book, Hoffer revealed a personal vendetta against doughnuts, and White had once eaten five doughnuts in a row.

On the witness stand, psychiatrist Martin Blinder stated that, on the night before the murders, while White was "getting depressed about the fact he would not be reappointed, he just sat there in front of the TV set, binging on Twinkies." In my notebook, I scribbled "the Twinkie defense," and wrote about it in my next report. The San Francisco Chronicle reported that, "During the trial, no one but well-known satirist Paul Krassner -- who may have coined the phrase 'Twinkie defense' -- played up that angle..."

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White's defense team included Twinkies as one item on a list of "junk foods" the former health-nut had been binging upon as evidence of White's personality changes due to stress, and as one among many symptoms of his deepening depression during the weeks leading up to the crimes -- leading to White's being convicted of Second Degree Manslaughter due to Diminished capacity (due to overwhelming negative public response, the "diminished capacity" plea since has been disallowed in subsequent cases).

For information on the origin of the "Twinkie Defense", see here, here, and here

From the onset of production in Autumn 2007 (many months earlier than any legislation had been proposed for the 2008 election ballots), the film's release dates had been intended to coincide with other planned dedication ceremonies and memorials of the thirtieth anniversary of the City Hall murders and all post-production and screening events were aimed near 27th November 2008

In 1977, conservative California state senator, John Briggs, proposed an initiative which would have prohibited suspected gay men and women from obtaining or keeping jobs teaching in California's public schools

After filing petitions bearing a half-million signatures, Prop 6 (the "Briggs Initiative") qualified for the November 1978 ballot

Newly elected city supervisor Harvey Milk debated Senator Briggs and publicly campaigned against his initiative

Analysts predicted a narrow defeat for the measure at best

Following a nationwide opposing campaign (publicly championed by counter-culture music industry fund-raising events), nearly 60% of California voters rejected the initiative

[*General time-line of other political issues mentioned in this film which have been discussed extensively on the message board--

1969 -- June -- The Stonewall riots in Greenwich Village against police harassment outside gay bars (where it had been illegal to serve alcohol to a known gay; illegal for same-gender couples to dance together publicly)

1973--- San Francisco's first "Gay Freedom Day Parade" held in Civic Center

1977--- singer Anita Bryant launched her unsuccessful "Save Our Children" campaign to make it illegal for gays to teach in Miami and Dade county, Florida (countered by the "We Are Your Children" campaign)

1978--- Prop 6, "Briggs' Initiative," defeated --18th November-- the Peoples' Temple tragedy in Guyana (involving hundreds of San Francisco Bay Area natives) --27th November-- the assassinations of Mayor George Moscone and supervisor Harvey Milk by former supervisor Dan White at City Hall

The events in the film's coda --

1979 May -- A peaceful march from the Castro to City Hall protesting the leniency of Dan White's sentence (manslaughter rather than premeditated murder) erupts into the "White Night Riots" upon reaching City Hall (resulting in retaliatory police rioting in the Castro later the same night)

1984 -- Dan White paroled after serving 5 years of a 7 year sentence for manslaughter

1985-- Dan White committed suicide in his estranged wife's garage in San Francisco

First and final segments are "Infinite Descent" from Thomas Newman's soundtrack to HBO's Angels in America (2003). The one that's featured right in the middle of the trailer is "Almost Martyrs" by Alex Parker, composed for the soundtrack of The Life of David Gale (2003).

"Queen Bitch," from David Bowie's 1971 album Hunky Dory

Five-and-a-half minutes of the recording Milk made during his Supervisor campaign (one year before his murder) can be found here

The beginning and end of Act III of Giacomo Puccini's 1900 opera, "Tosca"

- As Scott Smith moves out, Harvey Milk plays an LP record of tenor Giuseppe di Stefano performing the aria, E lucevan le stelle

- As Harvey Milk watches a performance of the opera, extra Catherine Cook appeared on stage as Nelly Miricioiu's voice was heard (from the TOSCA recording on the Naxos label, which was listed in the credits, even though the names of Miricioiu and tenor Miroslav Dvorsky were not).