A very powerful film

Rating: 10/10 (28 February 2006)

Like Ennis and Jack, Brokeback Mountain got me good. I don't remember a recent film where I forgot the leads were actors playing roles. All of them have major emotional scenes and some have more than one. How often does that occur in a film? Not often. Unlike some of the other reviewers on this site I never checked my watch even once during the several times I saw the film. With advance apologies if I belabor the obvious or inadvertently include "spoilers", here's what I think.
Though Ennis and Jack are gay this is not the reputed "gay cowboy" film that has generated so much hype. Rather its a human story about love, loss, the choices we make, and the choices that are made for us. These dictate our lives, and it doesn't mean that we live happily ever after because of them. This goes for Ennis's and Jack's wives as much as for Ennis and Jack themselves. I drew a parallel between this film and Casablanca. Both films have love, loss, and choice. The difference for me is that in Casablanca the choices that were made felt right. In Brokeback Mountain that's not the case and that's the tragedy. You feel that Ennis and Jack should have been together. Given the 1963 Wyoming time frame it would have been dangerous for them and heartbreaking for their families. Even as things actually turned out there was heartbreak aplenty to go around.
A couple of striking things about the film
1. Lust vs. Love. What began as lust wound up as love. Initially Jack wanted Ennis more than Ennis wanted Jack. The first tent scene had a good deal of lust in it. The much more important tent scene was the second one,where Ennis took the initiative to come to Jack. I thought it was a marvelous character touch that he came in tentatively, holding his hat between him and Jack as some sort of barrier that Jack has to (and does)remove. That's the beginning of the love story, and it lasts over the years of "fishing" trips. And remember that the tender second flashback scene, though it occurs late in the film, chronologically occurred in 1963 and forms part of Jack's acute sense of loss.
2. The Ending. Though the circumstances are tragic, I felt that the "epilogue" left some room for hope. Ennis's question to his daughter ("This Curt fellow, he loves you?") indicated he has been able to process his own loss and hold on to the emotion so apparent in the shirt scene. Its even more apparent when he says he will give up his job to attend her wedding--something he was never able to do with Jack, to Jack's desolation. And what exactly did Ennis want to swear to Jack? Leaving this unsaid and up to the viewer was a wonderful ending.
3. The Acting. The most expressive eyes and non verbal acting I've seen in a long time. My very favorite (though by no means the most powerful) is Heath Ledger's "guilty child" look (complete with gnawing finger) when Ennis tells Jack at the last minute that he can't make August.
4. Review comments about the story being and "old" one. Yes it is--as old as human nature.
5. I did not find Ennis's mumbling to be the problem others did. He's SUPPOSED to be that way--repressed and inarticulate. Its a part of his character and how he grew up.
6. My favorite (most moving) scenes: the second tent scene; the meeting after Ennis's divorce; the final meeting between Ennis and Jack; Ennis's phone conversation with Lureen; Ennis's visit to Jack's boyhood home; and finally Ennis's conversation with his daughter and his last words.
This film deserves all the awards it has already won and may yet win. It is an incredibly well written, acted, poignant, and heartbreaking film (and I didn't even mention the cinematography, which is awesome). Kudos all around to Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Williams and Anne Hathaway, and Director Ang Lee. Don't let the "gay/gay cowboy" label intimidate. If Monster didn't turn you into a mass murderer, chances are Brokeback Mountain won't make you gay. There's MUCH more to this film than that.