Posted on 01/27/2006 11:45:30 AM PST by Daralundy
When "Brokeback Mountain" opened last month, it was universally praised by critics, though the public seemed to think of it as "the gay cowboy movie."
But that label seems to be falling by the wayside as the film piles on awards and heads for the top of the box office, according to The Early Show entertainment contributor and People magazine Editor at Large Jess Cagle.
He says "Brokeback" was considered a major financial risk, but has raked in close to $45 million dollars so far, more than triple its modest budget.
And what's most surprising, Cagle observes, is who's driving the film's ever-growing popularity.
"Brokeback" is the story of a doomed love affair between two Wyoming cowboys.
Star Heath Ledger was drawn to the role despite the film's sensitive subject matter because "the story was so heavy and beautiful, and (because of) the opportunity to investigate this character, this incredibly complex figure."
After winning four Golden Globes last week, including best drama, "Brokeback Mountain" ticket sales soared.
You might think big cities are driving the film's success, but it goes much deeper than that, Cagle notes.
"What's driving the astonishing grosses for this movie," says Focus Features Co-President James Schamus, "is the numbers coming out of places like Little Rock (Ark.) and Billings, Mont. and Salt Lake City and Columbus (Ohio) and Pittsburgh. The film is doing business in every corner of America."
City slickers and country dwellers alike are lining up for "Brokeback," despite concerns that some moviegoers would shun the film because of its untraditional theme.
Now, it's arguably become the country's hottest date movie, Cagle says.
"It has become," Schamus says, "officially uncool as a guy to say 'No' to your girlfriend to this movie.
(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...
There is as much wrong with this article as there is with that goofy movie.
He announces loudly: "This is the pig I have sex with when you have a headache."
The wife: "Ah honey that's not a pig, that's a sheep."
The husband: "Be quiet. I wasn't talking to you."
(HTML is my friend.)
We need another movie like Death Hunt with Lee Marvin. In this movie several "men" were on a manhunt in northern Canada for a suspect ( Charles Bronson ) and they are camping overnight.
Andrew Stevens character, a rookie Mountie, is grabbed by a another mountainman, rough, guy type played by Ed Lauter ( Captain Knauer in the original Longest Yard ) and Lauter kisses him ( an extreme homo moment for a Bronson movie in 1981 ). Andrew Stevens character responds by beating the sh_t out of Lauter's character until Lee Marvin and Carl Weathers pull him off before he kills the guy. I cannot remember the wit parlayed at the moment, but it was let know men do not do that.
That would be a good queer movie to see.
Bingo. It IS propagand, plain and simple. CBS is likely owned by the company that put out this abomination. Miramar? You'll see it everyday if your astute enough to make the connections. If you see a movie "star" interviewed on say, "Good Morning America", invariably, the movie is made by the CBS parent company.
It's called cross-pollinization and all of the interviews, promos and such are all intertwined to get some sort of buy-in by the public.
I wasn't doubting anyone's intelligence. I was merely surprised by the tastes of some.
It is possible to separate the two and still say it was a good film, but...
I'm an Ang Lee fan. I even liked Ride With The Devil.
But, good story or not, some themes are beyond my tolerance and appreciation for a good story. This is one.
The Bridges of Madison County, which I did see, is another. I wasn't put off by a woman cheating on her husband, so much. That makes for ageless drama. What killed it for me was the poor smuck of a husband did nothing to deserve his betrayal, and at the end of the movie the kids are celebrating their Mom's unrepentant affair as an expression of hope. The kids seem to see her as a kind of self-sacrificing martyr.
A few years back someone gave my wife a copy as a gift. Makes me feel guilty. I won't watch it with her, so there it sits unopened.
Just because he can't make a comprehensible sentence?
No, because he is so disingenuous that he spouts bald-face lies like this to support his obvious agenda:
When "Brokeback Mountain" opened last month, it was universally praised by critics,
Universally by the "queer-as-transvestite" crowd he means, I suppose.
And that's just the way we like 'em--in the damn closet.
If you take it up the you-know-what,or put it up the you-know-what, you're gay.
Hell yeah-if you gotta see a movie about queers, thats the one to see!
Perhaps not, but just remind people that you were good looking way before that movie was even thought of!
That's because most guys are such wussified wimps that they won't even tell their girlfriends to move to the passenger seat of the car. Dragging their men to see this garbage is just another dose of neuterization that too many modern chicks give their males (who don't qualify as "men" IMHO) to keep them docile. Real men aren't afraid to tell chicks that practice mental and emotional castration to get lost.
I prefer the real deal, John Wayne flicks.
re: previous post -- I meant "most guys whose chicks drag them to see this garbage."
Kinda how I feel about one of the Afterschool Specials, that starred Kirsten Dunst when she was a kid, Fifteen and Pregnant. After all the trouble of showing the turmoil around the pregnancy, in the end, the family is happy, mom and dad are back together (no longer getting divorced), everybody smiles, etc. I never knew 15 yo's having babies could bring such happiness to the world (babies almost always do, but..).
It has become," Schamus says, "officially uncool as a guy to say 'No' to your girlfriend to this movie.
John Wayne/John Ford flicks!
What do you think is making it jump up in the standings and make more money? All the controversy. I said in about the 30th one it should just be ignored, and got flamed for it. People never learn.
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