Everyone has their own Brokeback Mountain

Rating: 10/10 (10 March 2006)

Exploiting love as an extremely profitable theme, the film industry has gradually reduced its primal significance to nothing but a couple of hackneyed platitudes. Adapting 'Brokeback Mountain' for the screen, a short story by Annie Proulx, Ang Lee not only breathed new life into the ossified genre, he managed to elevate an intimate relationship between two men to an unprecedented emotional level.
The movie tells the story of two young men, Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) and Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal), whose paths cross in Wyoming in the summer 1963. Two strangers hired as shepherds are sent onto the harsh slopes of Brokeback Mountain, where after some time they experience an unexpected and sudden burst of affection. What Ennis at first calls 'a one-shot deal' will appear to be the beginning of the long-standing relationship whose symbol will remain the mountain.
Ang Lee's movie is a classical, though gay, love story, and consequently the characters are not entitled to love. The fear of the narrow, small town mentality of locals is the reason why Ennis and Jack desperately try to forget about the affection and lead a normal life, getting married and starting families. However, the unfulfilled, secret desires impossible to satisfy become the source of drama.
The combination of the picturesque scenery and the outstanding performances given by Ledger and Gyllenhaal substantially contributes to the emotional atmosphere that Lee managed to capture in the film. The high artistic level is not even for a moment eclipsed by the very subtle intimate scenes, whose aim evidently is not to shock but to emphasize the depth of the characters' love. Surprisingly, the fact that two main characters are male makes the story is so meaningful and unpretentious. Watching 'Brokeback Mountain' one cannot resist the impression that such story could really happen.
Considered from a broader perspective, the story can serve only as a starting point for more general deliberations on the sense of our fulfilment in life. The inability of liberation from social or cultural constraints may become a human drama and Ennis saying 'If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it' hits the bull's-eye. However, it depends only on ourselves if we really have to stand it.