This film is a lot more than a movie. It's a deep look at human vulnerability.

Rating: 9/10 (15 April 2006)

Caution: my review here alludes to a key plot element that newbies to the movie would no doubt rather not know.
In reading all about Brokeback Mountain on IMDb, I am stunned to learn about the short-story origin of this movie. It appeared in The New Yorker magazine in 1997, and as in the film, a main character lives in Wyoming and is eventually brutally killed by gay-bashers.
It's rather disturbing that this story was published one year before Matthew Shepard in Wyoming was in reality brutally killed by gay-bashers. I am so hoping Annie Proulx's work had nothing to do with that terrible coincidence a year later. I wouldn't think that such types would ever read a New Yorker story to begin with, but maybe it got around and some brutes there took offense and decided to "make a statement" -- or make it come true.
Adding to the troubling nature of this, Annie lives or lived near the spot where Matthew was murdered, and she was even screened for jury duty for the trial. Needless to say, she was not selected!
For me, this adds a dimension of reality to the movie about the crazy fear and hatred some people project onto gays. I'm a straight female, but I just can't understand the rage that gay-bashers feel -- and I think some ancient Bible quotes are just an excuse for it, not a source of it. The sorrow and tragedy and vast loneliness in this movie, accurately depicted, takes viewers to a deeper level on this whole issue and starkly raises the question: What are the anti-gays really afraid of?