Saw Brokeback Mountain earlier today, and I'm still finding it difficult to articulate my thoughts on the film - not (I hope) because I've fallen into uncritical squeeeing or eughing but because I became caught up entirely in the huge emotional sweep of the thing to the extent that refocussing on the detail and (extremely minor) flaws feels somehow... to do it a disservice.
I honestly can't remember when last a film affected me as powerfully on such a visceral level. Xoc's the same, and I'm wondering to what extent we're reacting as gay men - because Brokeback Mountain didn't seem like a 'gay movie'. It felt more universal than that, a more classic tale of doomed love, albeit love which arguably didn't necessarily need to be doomed - hence the tragedy.
I'd been attempting to avoid as much of the media hype as possible, but I did read Proulx's short story beforehand. I'm glad I did, because it helped me in the early stages: rather than straining to glean plot from Ennis's mumbly monosyllables, I could sit back and let the slowly unfolding story - and particularly the beautiful visuals - wash over me. As Twist coaxes Ennis gradually out of his taciturn carapace, his dialogue becomes clearer. As Xoc says, though, it's the non-verbal stuff which truly dazzles, the glances and glances away, the oblique yet fluent body language in which car mirrors and cigarettes and hatbrims and belt buckles become extensions/expressions of the men's communication. Ennis, in particular, used his stetson as a defence mechanism, from the initial extraordinary silent 'pose-off' onwards.
Since so much was communicated visually, and in terms of the luminous Wyoming scenery itself, I really appreciated Lee's having taken time to unfold his story with languor - so the film's wide-open spaces reflected the achingly (frighteningly) gorgeous emptiness of the mountainside itself. It felt spare but unhurried. To a certain extent I can see Entity's problem with the paucity of explicit foreshadowing of the sex scene in the tent. I do think it's there, though, in the increasing physical and emotional intimacy ('stripping off') between the two men, and implicitly Ennis's talk of a coyote "with balls as big as apples" while rubbing down his own (presumably somewhat swollen) genitalia. There's definite sexual tension; it's just that Jack's so much more emotionally literate (and presumably one Kinsey numeral higher) than Ennis that he successfully manages the situation - avoiding frightening his nervy steer with overt attention - until events can no longer be resisted. When it does finally happen, it is a risk - Jack might get beaten to a pulp - but it's a (drunkenly) calculated risk which will be familiar to many gay men. I can absolutely recognise that inebriated sense of 'how the fuck did we get here?'. I think it works. There's a ring of truth (even to the sudden introduction of Jack's doubtless burnin' ring of fire...).
And yeah, it is close to rape, just as much of the open-air horseplay edges into fisticuffs. Isn't that part of the attraction, though? Like seasons on the mountain itself, Ennis and Jack's physicality is raw, elemental. It's a million miles away from 'gay' in any non-sexual sense.
Would saliva be sufficient lubricant? Possibly, I suppose, depending on the sizes involved. In the short story, there's also allusion to precum, in which case Ennis has either been dozing with a big, dripping stiffy or goes from zero to sixty pretty damn sharpish...
Although much has been made of the hott sex scene, I actually found myself more affected by the urgency and hunger of the 'four years later' moment. For me, that was the film's emotional pivot, and it puzzled me slightly when some of my fellow cinema-goers laughed at Alma's reaction. While Ennis's penchant for anal sex is clearly something of an ongoing pain in the arse (ho ho) for her, witnessing the cowboy clinch is the point at which Alma truly glimpses the lie at the heart of her marriage. Or rather, the impossible compromise.
(Xoc wondered whether the people who tittered at that point cried at the end. Valid question.)
"Rampant misogyny"? Well yes, I guess so, in the sense that, in the context of Ennis and Jack's twenty-year love affair, wives and daughters are (at least notionally) symbols of duty, impediments - and part of Alma's/Lureen's pain is that they're able to recognise that. I thought pretty much all the women were intelligently drawn, and I don't think they were portrayed by Lee himself in a misogynistic way. From Alma Junior to old Ma Twist, they read the situation on at least some level, partly intuited The Problem With Men Like Ennis/Jack - even as they were drawn to the romantic outsider archetype. I agree that, at times, it seemed implicit that every cowboy marriage included a tacit understanding/denial of necessarily discreet man-to-man lust - although Jack's bar scene with the 'rodeo clown' suggests that any such understanding is by no means universal. One mustn't frighten the horses, particularly in Texas.
One might conceivably level a charge of misogyny at the portrayal of Lureen and her increasingly ludicrous hairdos, but I think this is part and parcel of the new What Jack Did scenes (Jack's outfits and hair - particularly his facial hair - also morphs through varying degrees of '70s/'80s dodginess). Her increasing chilliness, particularly in that final, devastating 'phone call, is betrayed by the little sound she makes in her throat when the origin of 'Brokeback Mountain' is revealed. As with the other women, she knows.
*sigh*
It's still weirdly difficult talking about these scenes without twinges of the massive emotional wrench I experienced in the cinema. During the latter part of the film, I found myself holding my breath while tears and snot welled. Ennis's visit to the Twists is almost unbearable. I've never particularly been one to romanticise the iconography of the American West, but in Lee's film I felt I could genuinely appreciate the savage beauty of the open country, and the hardship of those lifestyles which depend upon it.
We left the cinema utterly poleaxed - but neither of us felt unduly manipulated. Heath Ledger, in particular, deserves an Oscar. He's been quoted in the UK gay press as saying that, on viewing the finished article, he was proud of his acting for the very first time - and he's 100% justified in expressing this. Every lead was strong, but his was a shattering, career-defining performance. Outstanding. |
