Let's just cut right to it, this show was painfully boring. There, I said it. A story built around partial amnesia has real potential, but between the choppy scene structure and random flashbacks thrown in constantly, the whole plot ends up feeling more tangled than it needed to be. The romance doesn't fare much better either, it's written so poorly that I never really found myself invested in this couple. Both leads come across stiff on screen and deliver their lines in a really awkward way. The show runs 8 episodes, each somewhere around 30 to 35 minutes. Hanuel, a 29 year old language teacher, wakes up after an accident only to realize his memory stops at age 19. It turns out he'd been in another accident back then too, which is why his memories cut off at that point. He has zero recollection of the fact that he's currently living with his childhood friend Saebyeok, who's now a huge celebrity. That makes the whole situation even harder for Hanuel to wrap his ...
The filmmaker builds this really vivid picture of Harvey Milk by weaving together old stock footage with interviews recorded nearly a decade after his assassination, and by the time it's done you walk away with a deep admiration for the man and everything he managed to do. Milk worked under San Francisco mayor George Moscone on a city supervisory board that was headed by Dianne Feinstein, and he wasn't just fighting for gay rights, he was speaking up for everyone who felt left out of the system. We get a look at his earlier adult life too, how he set up a camera shop with his partner, ran for office and lost three times before finally breaking into California politics. When he did win, it wasn't just because of the gay and lesbian vote. He was smart enough to pull together ethnic and racialized communities, unions, trade groups and other outsiders who had never before seen themselves on the same side as gay rights activists. That coalition building was genuinely ahead of its time. And then within a year of getting elected, both he and Mayor Moscone were shot and killed by fellow supervisor Dan White, the most conservative member of the board.
The film very much wants you to see Milk as a martyr and honestly, he was one. He even recorded his own will on tape because he felt his assassination was a real possibility. The story of what followed is almost as infuriating as the killing itself. White shot Milk five times, including once in the head, and was found guilty only of voluntary manslaughter, serving just five and a half years before being released. That verdict sent people into the streets. What I think makes this documentary so effective is that it was clearly made for everybody, not just gay audiences, not just San Franciscans, not just political junkies. It opens itself up and lets you genuinely feel how this one man changed the lives of the people around him, including in a strange way the life of the man who killed him. The filmmaker actually gives Dan White a surprising amount of context without ever excusing what he did. He makes sure you understand that White had spent his whole life in public service, gave up a stable job as a fireman for a poorly paid supervisor role and then quit out of frustration. None of that justifies anything, and the filmmaker's disgust at the lenient sentence White received is impossible to miss.
The interviews with people who knew Milk personally are what really stick with you. They're thoughtful, honest and give you a real sense of both the man and the moment in history he represented. (7/10)
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