Cowboy gone with the wind

Rating: 8/10 (29 January 2006)

I wouldn't say I was blown away, but I was impressed. Basing the film on a short story by E Annie Proulx of "Shipping News" fame, the accomplished Ang Lee has fashioned a picturesque absorbing and poignant, if rather slow, love story. The lovers happen to be two men, and cowboy society is not terribly tolerant towards "queers", but ultimately it is a story about a love affair where neither party can make a total commitment. Both marry, have children, and yet go on their "fishing trips" several times a year for 20 years. The central mystery is why don't they break away. The period of the film, 1963 to 1983, was the coming out decades for homosexuals in the US. Admittedly Wyoming was a backwater but to find other gays all you had to do was to get in the pickup and drive on some excellent roads to San Francisco. But Ennis and Jack somehow can't take the step.
Perhaps it is the tough backgrounds both characters have. Jack Twist's home was remarkably austere though his "American Gothic" parents, who we meet towards the end, seem loving in their stilted way. Ennis (an Irish name?) was orphaned as a child and brought up in a haphazard fashion by his brother and sister. It would be surprising if either had graduated from high school. Sheep herding is a minimum wage job (if you're lucky), though as it turns out later Jack does well as a tractor salesman.
As Ennis, Heath Ledger, a local boy (all right, he's from Perth, WA) must be in for a chance at an Oscar, though they tend not to go to male actors early in their careers. E Annie herself is reported as saying that Heath went deeper into Ennis's character than she did. It was a pity about the mumbling (oh, not another Brando!) but we got the drift  this is one choked up character. He also handled the aging well  at the end it was hard not to accept he was 40. Jake Gyllenhaal as Jack had more lines to play with and a less inscrutable character, but he also gives a fascinating performance. As the wives Alma and Lureen, Michelle Williams (the real Mrs Ledger) and Anne Hathaway (her real name!) do what is required. It is interesting that their reactions to the realization their husbands are gay are rather different. Alma, very much in love, is devastated, but Lurleen, who probably married Jack to get away from her bullying father, is prepared to live with it.
Ang Lee exploits the scenery shamelessly (as it happens Canadian rather than US Rockies, though it seems the sheep were American)  he is a very visual director. Man's presence in such places, he seems to be saying, is on sufferance  the first snow storm is evidence of that. Poor Ennis and Jack are not even on sufferance  they must even pretend their relationship is a secret when everybody knows about it. Randy Quaid as Joe the rancher gives Jack a full blast of his homophobia, but only because their foolin' around might affect the sheep. Joe missed the obvious point  if Ennis and Jack were foolin' around with each other, that meant the sheep were pretty safe.