Tim Daly as Dan White and Peter Coyote as Harvey Milk.

SHOWTIME

GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE November 26

Film of Harvey Milk's murder is a passionless vehicle for Tim Daly

Execution of Justice

Directed by Leon Ichaso Showtime

Reviewed by Michelle Tomko

Without experiencing it first-hand, it's hard to imagine what life was like in the 1970s gay mecca of San Francisco, the Castro. It was a truly unique place, where one felt a special safety and pride in being gay amid the backdrop of the AIDS epidemic, homophobia and right wing politics.

This Camelot even had its own King Arthur: "The Mayor of Castro Street" Harvey Milk; his Guinevere, Scott Smith and Lancelot, Mayor George Moscone.

But like every other small community in the country, it was not immune to tragedy. On the morning of November 27, 1978, Dianne Feinstein, then president of the city's board of supervisors, announces to the press: "Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk have been shot and killed. The suspect is Supervisor Dan White."

Just as quickly as the Camelot days for America ended on that grassy knoll in Dallas, so did they now end in the Castro.

On November 28, 1999, almost exactly 21 years after the assassinations, Showtime will première an original movie, Execution of Justice. The film tells the story of the murders, as adapted by Michael Butler from the Emily Mann play of the same

name.

The film is star-studded with Tim Daly (Wings, Object of My Affection) serving as executive producer and playing the role of Dan White.

Daly's wife Amy Van

Nostrand plays Mary Ann White.

Tim's Tony and Emmy award winning sister Tyne Daly (Cagney and Lacey, Gypsy) steps into the role of Goldie Judge, a neighborhood supporter who aids in getting White his supervisor position. Stephen Young (Patton, Soylent Green) is the liberal mayor George Moscone. Playing the passionate Harvey Milk is Peter Coyote, an experienced actor we all remember from E.T. and more recently, Patch Adams.

In a press conference on July 16, Tim Daly described the plot as: "The story lays out almost like a tragedy, with George Moscone being the king, and Dan White and Harvey Milk being two princes, one getting all the attention, and the other getting none.

"This guy [White] is the poster boy for the disenfranchised white male," said Daly of his character.

However, the movie turns out to be a shameless vehicle for Tim Daly, fueled by such narcissism as to humble Kenneth Branagh's Frankenstein. Unfortunately, the only talent Tim Daly shows off is the ability to give a one-note, two-dimensional performance. The drama was lost on cheesy surround shots of Daly drinking pop, eating Twinkies, and boxing in the gym looking really angry.

Watching this movie play out from the perspective of Dan White, especially this particular portrayal of Dan White, gives you the same feeling as watching a cooking show from the perspective of Jeffrey Dahmer.

As for the rest of the cast, Tyne Daly clearly did her cameo as a favor to her brother.

But looking at her on screen, she would have been in less pain if she had given her sibling bone marrow or a kidney instead of a perfor-

mance.

Better half Amy Van Nostrand reacted oppositely, entering into a competition with her husband to see who could over-act for absolutely no reason and with no motivation. The only suspense she adds to the film by flying off the handle with fake tears and screaming is that you wonder who is going to do the shootings her or her husband. There is no chemistry between them at all. This is laughable when you think about the fact that they are really married.

Straight-acting Khalil Kain's Sister Boom Boom with her wanna-be queen speech diatribes directly into the camera, breaks down the fourth wall in a movie that never should have left from behind the studio ones.

Ironically, the only stellar performances are by the two that get bumped off: Peter Coyote and Stephen Young. In this movie, it looks a lot less like political assassinations and a lot more like Tim Daly is just jealous of their quality acting.

As for Young and Coyote, don't expect to see their characters much. Young is seen very little on screen but still manages to give a well-rounded performance of Moscone. We see him in a struggle between being a sensitive man and a realist politician.

Coyote's portrayal of Milk is believable and entertaining. Tim Daly should have done a little less producing and a little more observing. Unfortunately, we spend very little time in the Castro, and the magnitude of what the killings did to the gay movement is all but ignored.

Rounding out the cast, Frank Pellegrino plays a supportive Frank Falzon. Shannon Hile as Dianne Feinstein is the most interesting of the leading ladies.

But the actors aren't solely responsible for the bust. Michael Butler's screenplay manages to take all the excitement and intrigue out of this story with Jesse Helms precision. What has the potential of being an exciting courtroom drama is turned into a flashback flick with unlikable characters.

For a perfect example of Leon Ichaso's direction, or lack thereof, look no further than Lisa Rhoden's part of Denise, Dan White's aide, whose only direction from Ichaso must have been to "look at Dan like you are in love with him—and be really obvious about it."

Plus, the film has a lot of mixed media: interviews with unnamed real people and documentary scenes, which only adds to the confusion and frustration. The unidentified real-life talking heads in some of the interviews are more interesting than the plot of the movie. You end up waiting for them to arrive as if the movie is a long commercial break.

The fundamental reason Execution of Justice doesn't work is because of Tim Daly's portrayal of Dan White. For a movie like this to work, the audience has to care about or be attracted to the villain on some level. That's the reason Kevin Spacey and Christopher Walken don't flip burgers for a living. But here, that just doesn't happen. Daly, and Van Nostrand for that matter, play unlikable nuts from beginning to end. You don't care about them, their family, their cause, or their fate.

The only valid reason to see this movie is if you were born after 1960 and were too young to remember these events when they happened. Know thy history. However, there are better choices for that. One is Robert Epstein's Academy Award winning 1984 documentary The Times of Harvey Milk. Another is a PBS documentary simply called The Castro. Finally there is a web site called Uncle Donald's Castro Street, at www.backdoor.com/castro, which evokes

the tears, laughter, and emotions that Execution of Justice fails to bring.