Brief Screening Report

1.Describe in detail one important scene from the film.

2.Explain why you think the scene is important.

3.Indicate at what specific point in the film the scene occurs.  You can reference DVD chapter numbers or you can use timing numbers for a streaming video.

Milk (2008) Written by Dustin Lance Black—Scene 10 (11:40-12:35)

The scene opens with Harvey’s and his partner, Scoot, in their apartment. Harvey is preparing food in the kitchen.  

HARVEY MILK: We'll form our own business association! Start with the gay-owned businesses... We'll take down the addresses of every customer that comes in for a roll of film. We'll ask them what they want to see done here... what they want changed... We'll get money rolling into this neighborhood. Revitalize it...           

SCOTT SMITH: Can I come in now?            

HARVEY MILK: One more minute! (Harvey goes back to his new scheme) I'll go to the neighborhood banks. They must have some gay customers.            

SCOTT SMITH: Harvey. What's with all this political activist crap? I thought you were a goddamn Republican.

      [Harvey walks into the small dining room holding two plates of food. He sets them out on a small dining room table, still rambling on to Scott in the bedroom.]            

HARVEY MILK: I'm a businessman, Scott. I think businesses ought to treat their customers right. Even their gay customers. For God's sake, this is San Francisco!            

SCOTT SMITH: Harvey. It's just like every other city in this country. People hate us. Big surprise.

HARVEY MILK: We should have at least one block in one city right? Start there and take over the neighborhood. (Harvey smiles) Okay, you can come in now!

      [Scott heads toward the kitchen. The table is LAID OUT with a home-cooked meal, CANDLES and a huge bouquet of FLOWERS.]            

SCOTT SMITH: Wow. This is--

            To me, this scene is one of, if not the most important scene, in the entire movie.  The scene comes really early in the movie but one of the reasons why I think that this scene is vital to the movie is because it puts the homosexual men and women during the gay-rights movement into two distinct groups. One group is willing to take the time to demand their legal rights as citizens and the right to be treated like any other human being without being discriminated for their sexual orientation. While the other group chooses to just sit by and do nothing, excepting the world the way it is, no matter how unjust.  As the movie progresses you witness more and more gay men and women embrace their homosexuality and fully commit to the gay-rights movement.

            Another reason why I find this scene so important to the movie is the setting of the scene what they’re doing while this conversation takes place.  During the scene Harvey is preparing a romantic birthday dinner for Scott. The apartment is small with a wide variety of things decorating their dining room. The way the scene is laid out, I think that the scene was used to make Harvey seem like your average person. Cooking dinner for a loved on, coming home and telling someone about your day, these are things that people do around the world every day. Homosexual or heterosexual, Harvey was just an everyday man doing everyday things. 

            The very beginning of Harvey Milk's political career begins in this scene. He didn’t just become a gay-rights activist overnight. Like any other person, Harvey wanted to live in a world where his sexuality wouldn't effect what he can do and how he is treated. He started out as a just your average man with idea about how he thinks the world should be and how we all should treat each other in it. 

Evaluating Movies

Think about your favorite movie or another movie that you think is an example of a really good movie. Think about why you respond to it the way you do. Do you respond more to formal elements (camerawork, lighting, sound, art design, editing, acting, narrative) or to cultural ones (assumptions, moral codes, and/or prejudices about gender, class, race, ethnicity, etc.)? What matters most to you? 

When I think of really good movie one of the first movies that I think about is the 2009 Avatar film written and produced by James Cameron. The movie stars Sam Worthington as Jake Sully, a wheelchair bound former marine, who comes to the Na’vi’s native planet, Pandora, to assists a mining corporation looking for unobtanium. Because of the lack of natural resources on Earth, The Resources Development Administration (RDA) recruits Jake as a spy to convince the Na’vi clan to leave Hometree, which sits on the largest amount of unobtanium in the area. While acting as a spy, Colonel Miles Quaritch, head of security, promises Jake that the RDA would pay for a spinal surgery that will restore his legs in exchange for intel about the Na’vi the lives resides in Hometree.  Unexpectedly Jakes falls in love with the ways of the Na’vi and with Neytiri, the daughter of the clan chief, and decides to take a stand against the RDA, resulting in the human being forced out of Pandora, back to their dying planet.  

 The thing that draws me into the movie is the idea of discovering and living among an entirely different species. As expected when two drastically different cultures collide with one another there was conflicted. The conflict between the Na’vi and the humans lead to violence but there where a handful of characters that tried to have a peaceful relationship with the Na’vi that was beneficial for the both of them. I think that I have always been interested in movies that has a nice combination of action, romance, and  the questioning of one's morals.

Crazy Brave #1

Discuss what the book has to say about the problem of domestic abuse, both in Joy's own life and more generally (for example, pages 142-147 and 156-159). Why are several men in Joy's life abusive? Why do the women they abuse accept the behavior? is it simply that these people are weak and violent? Or do certain social circumstances contribute to the problem?

The theme of domestic abuse in Joy’s life and in the lives of the people around her is branched out through the entire novel from beginning to end. At the beginning of the book you read about Joy's first encounter with domestic violence at home between her parents. When Joy was very young her father was loving and happy according to her very early memories. Then after some time her father became very angry and aggressive. I don’t really recall what triggered this change in her father but I think that how her father acted had strongly influenced how Joy thinks of men and her relationships with men when she gets older.  After the fallout with her father Joy then goes from one broken home to another, when her mother marries another abusive man.

         I don’t know if it was Joy’s intention to shared these stories of domestic violence that occurred in her own personal life and the lives of her friends and family to shed some light on how domestic abuse was a such a issue during that time. She mentioned a number of times in the book that there were no homes for abusive women during that time. Without a safe place for women to go when being abused I believe that they stay with their abusive spouses or boyfriends because they are afraid of the starting over again. Also during this time in Joy’s life women were treated differently than they are today. Today women have accesses to a number of different resources that could help if they find themselves in an abusive relationship. Also women today are very independent and are accepted into society without the having a man glued to their side.