Even better than the book

Rating: 10/10 (3 December 2005)

Wow. Just about perfect. The film really fleshed out the characters from the book, and I empathized with them more strongly. Enough that I'm not angry at Ennis anymore. I totally understand now why he did it. How he thought he had to.
The problem with advance word about great acting is that it was hard not to sit through the first half hour thinking, "Heath Ledger is doing fine, but 'a revelation'? Not quite getting that." But gradually I forgot it and by the end I was just in awe of what he had done.
And Jake. Just a joy to behold, every moment he was on screen. And that was his job, that was his character. What a wonderful character to light up this movie. Would have been so much darker and flatter without him.
The women were great, too, and I'm so glad their characters were expanded. The book focuses on two lives ruined, but you get a powerful sense here of it tearing up all four. Michelle Williams, in particular, is heartbreaking.
Oh, God, speaking of heartbreaking. My favorite scene in the book, hands down, was the reunion on the landing after four years--where they were so overcome with seeing each other, they grabbed each other and kissed passionately in broad daylight.
It was just as powerful on film, but topped by several others. I guess that says something extraordinary right there. The far-and-away best scene of one of the most beloved stories I have ever read, was bested about three times in the film. Would hardly have thought that possible.
SPOILER FOR 2 PARAGRAPHS: The second night they get together out on Brokeback was . . . well, like nothing I've ever seen before, but only in the sense that I've never seen it with men. Picture one of the all-time great romantic moments on film, and then imagine it finally challenged by something just as beautiful, complex and tender with two men. Finally. First time ever ever ever I didn't have to imagine a stand-in for the woman up there.
It was just amazing. They had "gotten together" in a late-night drunken situation that Ennis was completely unable to deal with in the morning. Or the next evening. He tells Jake he's not queer, that it was a one-time thing and that's that. But he can't stick to it. When he comes into the tent, he's completely at war inside. Trying desperately not to do it, but his heart begging him to finally accept what it feels. It is so hard for him, his struggle is so palpable, and Jack is so perfect with him. God me bawling again just remembering. And their last climactic scene together and what comes after: that is just so intense, slammed me in the skull so hard so many ways one after the other after the other.
Just devastating.
And I'm not going to say a whole lot here, but I do believe Heath's finest moment comes when Ennis visits Jacks parents and gets some news from his mom. What he doesn't say. What he works so hard to hide. God. That poor, poor man. How can you possibly blame that guy?
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So a strange thing happened to me after the film, while Ang Lee was interviewed onstage. (At the Denver Film Fest.) The interview was great. To listen to him is to know you are in the presence of a true artist, whatever you think of this particular film. (Or The Hulk.) Late in the discussion, the Denver Post critic brought up they gay question a couple times, dealing with the gay issue, the gay this the gay that. It was oddly jarring for me. So weird to hear it called a gay film or a gay love story or gay anything. For the last two hours, I had just been lost in an exquisite love story.
I know, I know, I have scoffed right here about people saying it's not a gay film: What! It's two men in love having sex. That's called gay. The entire story revolves around the forbiddenness of their love--because it's gay--the whole tragedy is centered on the problem of the men being gay.
Yeah, I have said all that. And it's all true. In that sense, it is a gay film, in two distinct and crucial ways. But I'm now seeing the other point of view, too. It's also an aching love story between two people who just happen to be gay.
The other great romantic movie of the decade--Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind--was also a gripping love story of two people fighting desperately both for and against their problematic love for each other. But it wasn't a film about a memory-erasing device was it? That was just the vehicle, the problem to present for these two people to fight madly for the love being ripped away from them. Exactly the same thing here.
All I know is, that in spite of knowing full well for the two-plus hours that it was the revulsion of homosexuality that was driving these two tragic lovers apart, I truly forgot about it being a gay thing. The love story was just too intense. It didn't matter what was driving these two guys apart, it was just about the intensity of the love between these two guys.
So I was literally startled to hear her using the gay word while I was still basking in that afterglow. Maybe because the concept of "gay love" is offensive to some part of me that is sick of hearing it distinguished from "love." It's exactly the same. For two hours I had not been watching gay love, I had just been watching love. It didn't feel like a gay film. It just felt like home.