The Rocketdog Blog

Brokeback Mountain

Right on time, two days late.

If all you’d ever heard of Brokeback Mountain was gleaned from listening to the opening monologues of late-night talk show hosts, you’d have to be forgiven for thinking it’s some kind of western-themed gay porn flick. Considering the context of the film’s release – a mainstream film about two homosexual cowboys, made by a high-profile heterosexual director with a likewise cast, crew, and screenwriting team – it’s really not surprising how quickly Brokeback Mountain became a shorthand reference for closeted guy-on-guy action.

It’s a caricature, of course, and one that gives a predictably misleading image of the film’s intentions; Brokeback isn’t really about “gay cowboys” at all, at least not in the sense you’d expect from listening to the pop culture fallout. Instead, Brokeback comes off as a fairly conventional Hollywood love story, albeit one set in a highly unconventional circumstance (i.e., between two guys in 1960s Wyoming).

In building their script around a type of unrequited love story that we’ve seen so many times (change a few names, places and genders and Brokeback Mountain easily changes back into its spiritual predecessor, Romeo and Juliet), screenwriters Annie Proulx and Larry McMurtry deftly take the focus off of the novelty of their two gay leads, instead allowing the powerful emotional relationship between Ennis and Jack to take its place at the center of the film. The result is a heartfelt and character-driven story, and one that communicates its social commentary in a vastly more effective way than a film with a more pointed, patronizing tone could ever achieve. Actually, this last bit is perhaps the most unexpected – and greatly appreciated – aspect of this very good film: it doesn’t follow the typical “message” movie formula, constantly beating you over the head with a moral issue about acceptance.

As a side note, straight guys who might be wary of watching two other men get it on for two hours can relax. I’m paraphrasing something I heard on a Mick LaSalle podcast, but the reason Brokeback Mountain is so unique lies not in its subject matter, but in its context: Yes, it’s a mainstream film about homosexuals, but it’s one made almost entirely by straight people and intended for a straight audience. To that end, there’s only one sex scene between Jack and Ennis, almost comically short at around 15 seconds and lacking any nudity. There are plenty of bare breasts, however (provided by Anne Hathaway and Michelle Wiliams). That’s right, Brokeback is a film about two gay cowboys with more shots of boobs than of naked men. If that’s not a clue that this film is intended for straight audiences, I don’t know what is.

Brokeback is a very solid film that gets everything just about right. That’s par for the course for Director Ang Lee, but he’s particularly on his game here. The performances are almost all excellent, but I have to admit that I’m not entirely sold on Heath Ledger’s much-lauded portrayal of Ennis. Ledger has been racking up accolades for his work in Brokeback, and while I think he’s fine for the most part, I’m not ready to jump on that bandwagon; there’s something inexplicable about his character that just didn’t ring true for me, and the problem’s not in the screenplay. On the other hand, Jake Gyllenhal has been receiving as much derision as Ledger has praise, but I think he plays Jack with a natural ease that is lacking in Ledger’s Ennis. Another minor issue for me is in the way the characters in Brokeback age – or rather, the way they don’t. The movie spans something like two decades, and with the exception of Jack’s grey hair and paunch, the characters just don’t show it. (Note to the makeup crew: slapping a blond wig on Anne Hathaway while she puffs on a cigarette isn't going to do a lot to give her an extra 20 years. Just saying.) In a film that gets so much else right, you have to wonder about a misstep this obvious, even such a minor one as it is.

Labels: movies

posted by nick @ 2:49 PM