Posted on 12/23/2005 5:39:51 PM PST by presidio9
When word got around among gay people that Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger, hunky Hollywood hotties du jour, were set to play ranch hands who fall in love in the idyllic mountains of Wyoming, there was a certain giddiness: Tight Levi's galore! The homoerotic Abercrombie & Fitch catalog writ large! A mainstream, romantic, holigay cowboy movie!
Then a herd mentality started to sink in, like a gay church praying at the altar of "Brokeback Mountain." There's a countdown on Gay.com ("It's finally here!"), E-vites are landing in in-boxes ("Let's watch it together!"), and blogs are keeping tabs on the film's awards, including seven Golden Globe nominations — the most of any film this year. The message is: If you're a self-respecting homosexual, you had better see this film, pronto.
Yet what's most surprising about "Brokeback" is that it's not a gay film. Not in the way gay films, especially those about gay men, usually are.
This is not a film about gay men and AIDS, à la "Philadelphia," which won Tom Hanks an Oscar, or "Love! Valour! Compassion!," the film version of the Terrence McNally play. It's neither comedic nor campy, nothing like "In & Out" or "The Birdcage." It's no "Kiss Me, Guido" or "Trick" or "The Broken Hearts Club," all set in big cities, with stereotypical gay characters — a thespian with the perfectly decorated Greenwich Village apartment, a West Hollywood muscle queen hooked on drugs — trapped in flamboyantly worn-out narratives.
Love repressed
Based on a spare short story by the Pulitzer Prize-winning Annie Proulx and directed by Taiwanese American Ang Lee ("Sense and Sensibility," "The Ice Storm," "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"), it tells the story of Jack Twist (Gyllenhaal) and Ennis Del Mar (Ledger), two vagabonds whose lifelong affair begins in Brokeback Mountain on a chilly night in 1963.
They part ways, marry women who don't know their secret and have children, only to reunite four years later with a deep, fiery, longing kiss that is arguably the most passionate man-on-man kiss to have been put on screen.
"Theirs is a story of a love that was repressed," Lee, who is married and has two kids, says in an interview. "That's really what drew me to the story."
Year after year, spanning two decades, Jack and Ennis reunite at Brokeback Mountain, frustrated, scared, still in love — and giving new meaning to "goin' fishin'," the excuse they tell their wives.
There is one sex scene in the movie, which Lee describes as "animalistic," "spontaneous" and "aggressive"; it stands in stark contrast to the kissing scene, which is meant to be "sexy." If you don't buy that kiss, Lee adds, then you won't buy the love affair.
"It's not about sex"
The film's old-fashioned romanticism wasn't what some early viewers had expected. "It doesn't fit into the current gay culture as we know it. It's not about sex; I was actually surprised that there wasn't that much sex in it," says Jonathan Rosales, 21, a recent graduate of the University of Southern California who saw "Brokeback" in Los Angeles.
Joseph Wiedman, a 31-year-old lawyer who saw the film in San Francisco, adds, "The big thing is: The movie is really well done and really accessible, for gays and straights. It's not preachy, as one of my friends pointed out, and not at all political. It's very personal."
"Brokeback" pushes the boundaries on two fronts: It's a Hollywood romance, but with gay men; it's a gay film, but with broader, more universal themes.
"They can call it whatever they want to call it; just don't call it a 'gay cowboy love story.' That's upsetting to me," says Paul Pecoriano, 35, an actor and waiter in Manhattan.
"It's a love story, period," says Pecoriano.
They have also been marketing it as family movie (!!!) with a normal hetero couple and a baby on the ad.
I agree with your sentiments. I honestly don't care if homosexuals have movies that cater to their lifestyle. What I do mind is the absolute lack of objectivity by the media in their reporting about the movie.
By all accounts the movie was a success in its niche market. But the reporting and praise the movie has been given makes it seem as if it was a mainstream success.
One hundred theaters, probably a few million in sales, and probably a million more before it is done, but its limited success cannot be extrapolated to mean that all of America has fallen in love with homosexuality. Or that it has become willing to accept the homosexual agenda. The movie's limited success fails to demonstrate even that not so subtle assertion by the media.
There's also the fact that if every gay man in America went and saw the movie, it should've done a hell of a lot better than it did. Which means that even the gay community didn't universally embrace this movie. And that is far more telling and far more important than the way the media has reported the movie's success.
Have no fear. The casting of two "hunky Hollywood hotties du jour" insurese that DVD sales will be just fabulous.
This is the most vomit-inducing "news article" I've ever read. How did you get through the whole thing?
hmm that doesn't seem so good (especially considering how much free plublicity it has gotten). Though it only cost 14 million so it will probably make its money back.
One hundred theaters, probably a few million in sales, and probably a million more before it is done, but its limited success cannot be extrapolated to mean that all of America has fallen in love with homosexuality.
You ain't seen nothing yet. Wait till the month before they hand out the Oscars.
...story about a man who loves his Black Lab so much, that he has sex with it.
**
Look for that one to be winning all the awards next year. The following year will be the year of the "groundbreaking" necrophiliac movie.
Actually neither star is a homosexual. Heath Ledger has a child with his onscreen wife in the movie, Michelle Williams.
Actually neither star is a homosexual. Heath Ledger has a child with his onscreen wife in the movie, Michelle Williams.
Then again, the characters in the movie have a wife and kids.....hmmmmm.
It's a love story starring two faggots.
Worse -- it is a love story about 2 sheep herders not cowboys.
Now we know where these deviants turn when the sheep start getting too boring...
Your going to have a pretty long list of actors to not see if your going to boycott every actor who has played a gay man. I would hate to think I refused to see The Godfather because Al Pacino played a gay man in Dog Day Afternoon. It's a role and nothing more. It certainly doesn't seem to be the actors pushing the movie rather the media.
The last movie I saw was "We Were Soldiers Once...". The one before that was "Braveheart". Hollywood doesn't get much of my money no matter who is in the movie. They just aren't worth the time, effort and money involved to go to the theater to see the garbage. With only a few exceptions, like Mel Gibson, of course.
"Homos on the Range" would be a better title. They are still beating this dead sheep, trying to convince normal people that they would enjoy paying $8 to see perverts kissing.
Quick: What was Al Pacino's last good movie? Scarface?
***Perfect venue for the late Hunter boys - Rock and Tab.***
Why not make it a threesome with Van Johnson!
Brokeback Mountain, where the sheep are relaxed and the Rams are nervous!
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