Brokeback Mountain (Widescreen Edition)
by Ang Lee
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Actor: Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Williams, Randy Quaid, Valerie PlancheDirector: Ang Lee
Brand: NBC Universal
Producer: Bill Pohlad
Producer: Diana Ossana
Writer: Diana Ossana
Producer: James Schamus
Producer: Jordy Randall
Writer: Annie Proulx
Writer: Larry McMurtry
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 5.1; English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 5.1; French (Dubbed), Dolby Digital 5.1
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 134 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-04-04
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Universal
DVD Reviews of Brokeback Mountain (Widescreen Edition)
DVD Review: So much more...
Summary: 5 Stars
...than just a 'gay cowboy movie.' But also just that. Two rough and tumble, unschooled, primitive men of the American West come to learn painfully and ultimately, tragically, that Marlboro men do indeed sometimes fall for each other...
After some 756 reviews, one is hard pressed to say something refreshing about this film. Yet, the sheer fact that discussion about BBM is so alive and thought-provoking attests to the greatness of this film as a piece of art. Ang Lee has succeeded in creating something so visceral, so moving, so elusive and infinite in its meanings that twenty years from now, we'll still being try to decipher it.
While some of the reviewers have referred to Jack and Ennis as 'unsympathetic' characters, I would rather use the word, 'human.' Yes, human. A story about two deeply flawed and deeply scarred human beings who struggle to find a way to that which redeems us all: love. Ennis and Jack's struggle is a universal one, that of loving somebody in the fullest and most elemental sense of the word. That is why this film is for us all, regardless of sexual persuasion. BBM is an epic tale about the costs of loving somebody whom your world, your family and even yourself deems to be unacceptable or just plain 'wrong.'
From the minute we see them, Ennis and Jack are more than just gruff ranch hands thrown together by the whims of fate. As he gets out of his beat-up pick-up and very deliberately saunters(dare I say, sexily) towards an Ennis caught in the burn of his gaze, Gyllenhaal's Jack Twist is out for something. And that something just happens to be Ennis Del Mar. As he spies Ennis through his side mirror whilst shaving, Jack is a man under a spell. Unconciously or consciously, acting on his desire for Ennis is just a matter of time. As both men move up the mountain, the ball between them starts to roll, picking up momentum with each gorgeous shot of the Canadian Rockies. Ledger's Ennis wears the face of man fighting back every feeling he might have, and feelings for Jack especially. But feelings and desire have 'no reins on them' as Ennis accurately points out. Both characters slowly succomb to these feelings as their time on Brokeback passes. Ang is the master of the tiny things that speak volumes. Whether its his intense concentration NOT to look at the naked Ennis or his child-like concern over Ennis' wounds, Jack indulges in his initial fascination and lets himself be ready for the moment. And that moment soon comes with one of the most raw and REAL portrayals of homoerotic passion you'll see this side of pornography. While born of the moment, Jack and Ennis' explosion is the culmination of their evolving and very unacknowledged desire for one another. How this scene could have surprised and/or shocked anybody is beyond me. All the signs were there, you just had to be looking.
Like the black and white of a checkerboard, Ledger and Gyllenhaal complement each other like few other on-screen lovers have. Gyllenhaal's performance is nothing if not amazing. How a straight actor could manage to capture Jack's open yearning for another man so perfectly, so precisely, is simply miraculous. Jake's Twist is almost innocent in his near-joyful acceptance of the possibility that Brokeback offers. He is the ennabler of the relationship, always looking for the road down the mountain where their fire can be continued. Yet, even Twist is confused by what this could all mean. 'Me neither,' he replies to Ennis' adamant declaration of not being 'queer.' Part of the film's excruciating beauty is that both characters never really come to terms with who they are. Men who love each other.
No ride off here into the sunset. Ennis and Jack are the products of their time. 1963 America, where every man had to be JFK and every lady, Jackie. And if you weren't, you'd best keep it to yourself, far in the closet, far from Mr. Kinsey. More than that, BBM's world is rural, frontier, hardscrabble 1963 America where the mere idea of two men loving each other represents an assault on that most precious icon of Americana, the cowboy. The laconic champion of simple goodness who stands for justice and defends the weak against the guys in black hats. Falling in love with another cowboy ain't in the scipt and that's what makes Jack and Ennis' love so heroic, so fragile, so ultimately doomed.
So you've had sex a couple of times with a buddy out in the boondocks and now it's time to come back into the rigid, heterosexual world of 1960's America. What's a queer cowhand to do? Get married, sire a couple of kids and try to put it all behind you. Jack and Ennis follow suit, but nature can't be held back. Their first meeting after their marriages has to be one of the most passionate and tortured film 'kisses,' if that's the word one can use here, you'll ever see. Ledger and Gyllenhaal will leave you in a whirlwind. As will Michelle William with her performance as Alma, Ennis' wife. Alma's look of shock and disbelief as she stares through the glass window at her husband entwined in the arms and lips of another man is just one of the many grand cinematic moments in this film. Alma's face is one of profound confusion. What just happened and what does it all mean? Michelle Williams is indeed one of the highlights of BBM. She doesn't need to say anything, her taut and pained expressions tell it all. A woman struggling to pick up the pieces of her shredded dream with dignity and self-respect. Moreover, Ann Hathaway does a stellar job as Laureen Newsome, Jack's attractive Texas wife, a woman captivated by Twist's bull-riding prowess and boyish smile only to gradually learn what Alma knows early on.
As the years drag by, both men settle for the costs and freedoms of the double life. Fishing trips to Brokeback a couple times a year and then back to the lie with their women and families. A lot has been mentionned already about the extreme damage both men cause their families. And the claim is valid enough, if not too realistic. Proulx and Lee wanted to show characters of THEIR time, crippled and blinded by THEIR circumstances, by THEIR environments and not least, by themselves. After having witnessed the horrid aftermath of a hate crime as a young child, is it any wonder that Ennis has become a walking time bomb, striking out at anybody rather than admit he might not be all that different from the old rancher his father murdered. Think about it people, most of us in Ennis' situation would have also strived for the so-called 'normal' life.
Like Twain's Mississippi, Lee and Proulx's Brokeback is a mythical place. Lee's masterful use of the West's untouched natural grandeur is without parallel. Is not the mountain the third character in this relationship? A place where the two lovers, like Adam and Eve, can act out their feelings in complete harmony with their surroundings. A place unfettered by social constraint, tradition, expectation. A place which allows Jack and Ennis to do that which should come most easily, to love. Brokeback is a profoundly 'American' place, far from the maddening crowd, a place where self-limitation and painful compromise are unknown. A place where it's all up to you to create your own heaven and/or hell. Yet, such freedom comes at a heavy price. As Jack rightly says, 'Brokeback is all we got!' What was once their playground of freedom, soon becomes their prison, their hideaway from the lies of their everyday lives. Jack had the answer once. He was willing to give this 'thing' a chance. A ranch together, a life together...but Ennis's fear is just too much to overcome. 'Two men living together...if you can't fix it, you gotta stand it.' And with such stoicism, Ennis nails the lid to both their coffins. Denied the only one he ever really wanted, Jack looks elsewhere for his Ennis substitutes, which eventually lead to his ignominious murder. Yet, could he have done otherwise? Could he have been strong enough to forget Ennis Del Mar and cut off their relationship completely? Are any of us strong enough to deny ourselves true love when it comes our way? Is Ennis to blame for driving Jack to his death, for fostering his own emotional death due to his inability to conquer fear? Who can judge? Certainly not us. Such is the complexity of Ang Lee's art that it defies our natural desire to point the finger at the characters.
Brokeback finishes on the same note it began, one of omnipresent sorrow and unbearable longing, longing destined to be unfulfilled. Shattered by Jack's murder and more importantly, by his own culpability in it, Ennis Del Mar has become a violent and empty shell of a man when his loving daughter, Alma Jr.(played brilliantly by newcomer Kate Mara), invites him to her wedding. When asked whether her boyfriend truly loves her, she replies, 'Yes, Daddy, he does.' Ennis winces in pain, in regret at not having done like his daughter, at not having accepted love when it came his way.
With Ennis's faintly voiced, 'I swear...,' a great American film closes. And so much more than that. A biting and gritty lesson on how lives should and should not be lived. The reasons for watching BBM, repeatedly I might add, are many. More than anything, BBM should be seen and seen again as an example, par excellence, as to what a genius with a camera is capable of creating. Ang Lee's visual poetry, similar to that of another maverick director, Terence Malick, is breathtaking. Whether it be a single tear down a cheek, a look up at the camera in fear and confusion, icy red lips before the phone or the ultimate cowboy posing before the rocket's red glare, Lee manages to create scenes that will remain in you long after the lights are up. Like a Hucklberry Finn of its day, Brokeback Mountain is more than just an indignant cry against injustices that remain with us still. It's all that and so much more...
Description of Brokeback Mountain (Widescreen Edition)
Brokeback Mountain is a sweeping epic that explores the lives of two young men, a ranch hand and a rodeo cowboy, who meet in the summer of 1963 and unexpectedly forge a lifelong connection. The complications, joys and heartbreak they experience provide a testament to the endurance and power of love. Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal deliver emotionally charged, remarkably moving performances in "a movie that is destined to become one of the great classics of our time" (Clay Smith, The Insider). Starring: Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Williams, Anne Hathaway, Linda Cardellini, Randy Quaid, Scott Michael Campbell, Anna Faris, David Harbour Directed by: Ang LeeA sad, melancholy ache pervades Brokeback Mountain, Ang Lee's haunting, moving film that, like his other movies, explores societal constraints and the passions that lurk underneath. This time, however, instead of taking on ancient China, 19th-century England, or '70s suburbia, Lee uses the tableau of the American West in the early '60s to show how two lovers are bound by their expected roles, how they rebel against them, and the repercussions for each of doing so--but the romance here is between two men. Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) and Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal) are two itinerant ranchers looking for work in Wyoming when they meet and embark on a summer sheepherding job in the shadow of titular Brokeback Mountain. The taciturn Ennis, uncommunicative in the extreme, finds himself opening up around the gregarious Jack, and the two form a bond that surprisingly catches fire one cold night out in the wilderness. Separating at the end of the summer, each goes on to marry and have children, but a reunion years later proves that, if anything, their passion for each other has grown significantly. And while Jack harbors dreams of a life together, the tight-lipped Ennis is unable to bring himself to even consider something so revolutionary.
Its open, unforced depiction of love between two men made Brokeback an instant cultural touchstone, for both good and bad, as it was tagged derisively as the "gay cowboy movie," but also heralded as a breakthrough for mainstream cinema. Amidst all the hoopla of various agendas, though, was a quiet, heartbreaking love story that was both of its time and universal--it was the quintessential tale of star-crossed lovers, but grounded in an ever-changing America that promised both hope and despair. Adapted by Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana from Annie Proulx's short story, the movie echoes the sparse bleakness of McMurtry's The Last Picture Show with its fading of the once-glorious West; but with Lee at the helm, it also resembles The Ice Storm, as it showed the ripple effects of a singular event over a number of people. As always, Lee's work with actors is unparalleled, as he elicits graceful, nuanced performances from Michelle Williams and Anne Hathaway as the wives affected overtly and subliminally by their husbands' affair, and Gyllenhaal brings surprising dimensions to a character that could have easily just been a puppy dog of a boy. It's Ledger, however, who's the breakthrough in the film, and his portrait of an emotionally repressed man both undone and liberated by his feelings is mesmerizing and devastating. Spare in style but rich with emotion, Brokeback Mountain earns its place as a classic modern love story. --Mark Englehart
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