Playing against type

"Sean Penn has now put a face to gay rights as Harvey Milk in the new Gus Van Sant true-story film “Milk”.While we’ve seen Penn deliver Oscar-worthy roles before (he won for “Mystic River”) and he does again for Gus Van Sant (“Good Will Hunting”, “Finding Forrester”, “Paranoid Park”), what assists in the power of his transformative character performance is the complement of a sea of other notable actors playing against type. We’re treated to an entirely new way to look at Emile Hirsch – whose character range is now light years away from 2007’s “Into the Wild” – and Diego Luna.
Source: www.hollywoodchicago.com