Love?

Rating: 8/10 (2 June 2006)

There are many who will disagree with my thesis straightaway, so I will begin with it: Brokeback Mountain is not a movie about a love affair between two men, but a movie about addiction.
Do not dismiss that statement easily; I write as an addict. One of the marks of addiction is the willingness to pursue an activity or substance irregardless of the costs to one's family, job and/or financial situation. Homosexuality in America has, at least until recently, been likely to be hurtful to all of those aspects of life, and I would certainly not say that homosexuality in general is addictive or based on an addiction. But this film offers much more concrete details that point to the particular relationship portrayed being based upon addiction--besides the fact that the men pursue their relationship despite the fact that they both have wives and children.
1) These words from Jack: "You count the d*** few times we have been together in nearly twenty years and you measure the short f***ing leash you keep me on - and then you ask me about Mexico and tell me you'll kill me for needing somethin' I don't hardly never get. You have no idea how bad it gets! I'm not you... I can't make it on a coupla high-altitude f***s once or twice a year! You are too much for me Ennis, you sonofa*****son b****! I wish I knew how to quit you." Come on, do we really think that people satisfy a (legitimate) need for love by enlisting the services of a prostitute? Consider the case of a man whose wife has just given birth; would we really say that for him to visit a prostitute during the "no sex" period "satisfies" a "need" that his wife cannot meet? Are we to believe that sex equals love?
2) The loss of control and the single-minded focus on the addictive behavior. Ennis speaks about the lack of control: "Bottom line is...we're around each other an'...this thing, it grabs hold of us again...at the wrong place...at the wrong time...and we're dead." You also see it when the two get together for the first time after 4 years: they act as though they're going to lay each other right there on the stairs. And both men do and say things that give away their single-minded attention to this one thing: Ennis is almost completely unresponsive to his family as he returns from the motel to prepare for their first "fishing trip", for instance.
3) Selfishness. As I said before, the men pursue their relationships despite having wives and children. But each man also allows and willingly provides for the other man to be unfaithful to his wife; Ennis the divorcée is no less wrong because the person he is "fishing" with is married.
Having said all that, I really liked the movie. It challenged me, made me uncomfortable; it haunts me now. But it also haunts me that this is called a "love story."