ARTIST OF THE YEAR
GUS VAN SANT
Coming after several years of smaller, independent films from the director (2003's Cannes Palme d'Or winner Elephant, 2007's Paranoid Park), Gus Van Sant's latest mainstream movie foray, Milk, is arguably his most ambitious undertaking to date. The robust cast of young actors is rivaled in number only by Spartacus and 300, yet with his deft hand he manages to make ample use of every actor who comes into the frame, most notably Sean Penn, James Franco, Diego Luna, and Emile Hirsch. Though Van Sant has always favored realistic and compelling storytelling over creating positive gay role models for their own sake, in Milk his admiration for the San Francisco politician is clear.The road to Milk was hardly an easy one, with everyone and their boyfriend racing to get rights to various versions of the story onto the screen. After Van Sant read Dustin Lance Black's tremendous script and signed on to direct the film, Academy Award–winning producers Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen quickly came on board, and in a matter of months, the Portland, Ore.–based Van Sant was on his way to San Francisco to create the long-awaited epic. Both Penn and Franco cite Van Sant's involvement as the major force behind their interest in heading the cast. The auteur—whose genre-defying films include Drugstore Cowboy, My Own Private Idaho, the Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting, Finding Forrester, and Last Days—will undoubtedly have a very busy awards season next spring as Academy voters consider Milk.
