John Wayne is Probably Trembling In His Grave

Rating: 6/10 (17 August 2006)

In 1963, in Wyoming, the rancher Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) and the rodeo cowboy Jack Twist (Jake Gynllenhaal) are hired to watch the sheep along the summer in the Brokeback Mountain. In a cold night, the get drunken and have sexual intercourse after months of loneliness. When their assignment ends, Jack moves to Texas and Ennis to Riverton and they raise families of their own. Years later, when they meet each other, a passionate bond connects them and they fall in love for each other. They affair lasts for more than twelve years when a tragedy happens.
"Brokeback Mountain" is a dramatic romance, with great and brave performances of Heath Ledger and Jake Gynllenhaal and magnificent landscapes. However, the story about the forbidden and repressed love between two cowboys is not for all tastes including mine and this movie is overrated. The characters do not assume their relationship and betray their wives and families, and their gay thing is despicable, since both are in lust, not in love for each other. Further, I was raised watching western movies with tough cowboys like John Wayne, and this image is very difficult for me to be dissociated. Ang Lee seems to want to impact this "Malboro" image. Last but not the least, the career of the Chinese director Ang Lee needs to return to his origins: after the terrible "Hulk", directing a movie with cowboys-gay is quite surrealistic. Surprisingly many people liked it. My vote is six.
Title (Brazil): "O Segredo de Brokeback Mountain" ("The Secret of Brokeback Mountain")