Brokeback Mountain

[smo]

Ang Lee's a really interesting director who tries his hands at movies on the complete opposites of the spectrum with masterpieces in their own right such as Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and The Ice Storm... respect to him.

I am sure Brokeback Mountain is worth seeing too - he has never failed to deliver so far (although The Hulk was not *that* fantastic) .

Please don't make me laugh, I mean, cry! (Actually I don't know whether to laugh or cry...)

Living in Los Angeles has its dis/advantages: being so close to the "industry" one tends to see the warts underneath the hype - so at the risk of being tarred and feathered, here's my own chart of the Ang Lee phenomenon:

- when "The Wedding Banquet", the movie that put Ang Lee on the map, was coming out, since more than half the cast of characters were Asians, our group of GVA, Gay VNmese Association, among other local gay groups was invited to a test screening. The PR people were anxious to hand out review cards, because according to an insider, they weren't sure of the movie's ending. I agreed, feeling what a mess it was.

- Because of the watershed success of "Crouching Tigers..." I finally watched it on DVD, wondering why such a fuss. Whereas the western audience hitherto was quick to snicker upon seeing chinese actors trampoline over high walls in ancient Shaw Brothers martial-arts flicks, they now ooh-aahed at the sight of Chow Yun Fat walking Christ-like on water, or what's her name swooping like swallows upon the surface of a lake. Herein lies Lee's Midas touch. Sad to realize though that King Hu, the maker of "A Touch of Zen," the movie which inspired Lee for the bamboo fight scene which everybody raved about, died an obscure death after heart surgery in Pasadena less than a decade ago.

- Ang Lee appeared at a Q&A session of another preview screening. This time it was "The Ice Storm", his post-Crouching Tiger film. I had to give him credit for his candor in admitting that he was at a loss of how to put the movie together once the shooting was done, until he brought in the music composer to provide him with some (musical) clue. The final product clearly showed how clueless he truly was. (At this point I'm reminded of another hype, that of "Angels in America". Remember "Angels in America", the HBO version that was?)

But by then Lee had already ascended to the pantheon of movie-making gods. So now if Brokeback Mountain becomes such a hit, I'm glad that for gay movies, it is no longer necessary to be all-smiling, all-dancing numbers in Village People formation. I have a friend who steadfastly collects every movie that contains any gay-element in it, even if the gay character had to end up like Matthew Shepard.

In the words of a L.A. critic, not quite as jaded as I am, BM is "a weepie alright though it did not hit me in the face the way "The Crying Game" did" - my guess is that his pun was intended. I myself would rather cry over gay penguins, or for that matter over Matthew Shepard, whose memory is held in a forlorn-looking shrine at a street corner in West Hollywood, any day.

Mr DeMille, I'm ready to be dunked into the La Brea Tar Pits!

PS -Up to my elbows now, but happy to report that due to the notoriety that BM is garnering, Annie Proulx finally shows her face in the press and what a granny lesbo she is! Vive Annie Proulx! (Once I douse off the tar, I am gonna rush out to buy BM re-issued as a novel. Must be the skinniest novel ever published!)

[Boon Mee]

Just saw the movie.

Not read any comments thus far in this thread but here's my two satangs worth:

Cinimatography was great but not worth 1-1/2 hours of boredom for a little more than a 2 hour movie. In the end, I thought it was an attack on commitment, an attack on family, and it is a sign to us all that the moral decline in America is reaching an all time low.

An opinion which I'm sure will draw some fire here…

Edited January 23, 2006 by Boon Mee

[Ijustwannateach]

Everyone's entitled to his own "opinion." One might also surmise that there is something immoral in the social pressures which prevent gay men from finding their legitimate place in society and getting trapped into tragic marriages.

"Steven"

[Boon Mee]

Everyone's entitled to his own "opinion." One might also surmise that there is something immoral in the social pressures which prevent gay men from finding their legitimate place in society and getting trapped into tragic marriages.

"Steven"

Nothing of the sort.

The issue I have with the movie is what is acceptable now was not back then. The accepted norm of family and commitment from back then is under attack right now. No matter how much some wish it was acceptable for, what were their names...Jack & Enis? to have the sex they wanted to, we can't trick the viewing public with an attack on commitment.

[Ijustwannateach]

I would argue that there was a inherent social attack on their commitment to their own happiness (as gay men) long before their desires created an attack on their commitment to their heterosexual partners. Not that two wrongs make a right... I know a number of gay men with formerly straight lives (and wives)- many of the wives are not happy at all with what happened to their families (though in all of them the men kept certain financial and family obligations re. children, etc.). But I feel there is at least as much responsibility to attach to the heavy social pressures "back then" as you say to get married as there is to the poor choice of commitments made by certain gay men.

"Steven"

[Boon Mee]

Well, getting back to the specifics of the movie, I would maintain there is a basic lack of integrity on the part of Jack & Enis. These guys develop a relationship after spending time on the mountain herding sheep for the summer. After one night of drinking a fair bit of whisky, the 'love' commenced. Perhaps the two men really did love each other but the film maker did a poor job of showing that. The basis for their continued relationship was sex.

The relationship between the two men is being held up on high by many in the media. What is not being talked about are the wives and the commitments to the wives. What we don't hear about in the media are the kids. These two guys are more concerned with going back up to that tent on the mountain which demonstrates they don't have the integrity to stand up for a commitment they made to their wives and kids. Basically, what the media and Hollywood missed is you can't apply year 2006 ideals to a 1960's based film. And, the most annoying message Hollywood is doing is attempting to squash any record of family values and commitment to your spouse.

Just my two satangs - no disrespect meant here one bit.

Edited January 23, 2006 by Boon Mee

[Ijustwannateach]

I think we're talking at cross purposes here- you see the commitment they made to their wives and children as negating any commitment they should have to their own happiness. I can see the importance of both commitments, and I understand the need for guys who are trapped in one to find a way to satisfy the other. Would you prefer they remained unsatisfied and unhappy for life, perhaps dying early from the stress and unhappiness? Perhaps we just have to agree to disagree. I'm looking forward to seeing the movie, too.

"Steven"

[Boon Mee]

I think we're talking at cross purposes here- you see the commitment they made to their wives and children as negating any commitment they should have to their own happiness. I can see the importance of both commitments, and I understand the need for guys who are trapped in one to find a way to satisfy the other. Would you prefer they remained unsatisfied and unhappy for life, perhaps dying early from the stress and unhappiness? Perhaps we just have to agree to disagree. I'm looking forward to seeing the movie, too.

"Steven"

For sure, see it and make up your own mind re the points I'm bringing up.

We have to remember that it is still just a Hollywood movie.

[PeaceBlondie]

Boon Mee, I respect your point of view which apparently says that once two men had made commitments of marital fidelity to their respective wives, they shouldn't have gone out and had a fling with another person, male or female. In the 1960's, that was the paradigm - that every man except a Catholic priest was expected to fall in love with some sweet young female thing, marry her, make love probably in the missionary position (no anal or oral intercourse expected), have babies, etc., etc., until one of them died of Alzheimer's in the old folks' home.

It seldom happened. Half of all marriages ended in divorce, and many more heterosexual marriages were full of abuse, neglect, adulteries, etc.

Commitment is a nice thing for Catholic priests, if they can keep their willies out of their young female parishioners. In the rare examples when it worked, even in the 1960's, functional marriages were great things.

Trouble is, especially back then when I decided to go straight when I knew I had desires elsewhere, it was nearly suicidal to choose homosexuality then. The 'stable, commited relationship' which straight couples aspired to, were taken for granted but were nearly impossible for two men to share.

Gee, now I'll have to go see the movie.

[meadish_sweetball]

I think we're talking at cross purposes here- you see the commitment they made to their wives and children as negating any commitment they should have to their own happiness. I can see the importance of both commitments, and I understand the need for guys who are trapped in one to find a way to satisfy the other. Would you prefer they remained unsatisfied and unhappy for life, perhaps dying early from the stress and unhappiness? Perhaps we just have to agree to disagree. I'm looking forward to seeing the movie, too.

"Steven"

For sure, see it and make up your own mind re the points I'm bringing up.

We have to remember that it is still just a Hollywood movie.

I think Brokeback Mountain just illustrated the horror of being gay in a time where it was not nearly as accepted as it is today. How messed up and unhappy it could make people. As such, I definitely do not see it as 'anti family'.

In the end, the relationship between the cowboys did not give them any lasting happiness, apart from the times they snuck away on their 'fishing' trips. The camera time and time again lingered on the suffering of the neglected wife and children... so the fact that it shows two people unable to handle commitment to their families does not mean it promotes them not honouring that commitment, does it?

Is it not in fact in some ways a 'pro-family values' movie, indicating that the main characters were irresponsible to start families they could not handle? I think you twist the whole thing around Boon Mee. The movie does not claim to be 'the ultimate movie about cowboys in the sixties'. Nobody in their right mind would leave the movie theatre and think "Oh, so all cowboys back then were in fact gay? Wow, and to think I never realized that!". Rather, this movie shows a story of two people who happened to be gay and cowboys, and what effect this had on their lives and on the people around them.

It tries to show a completely different piece of reality than all the other Hollywood movies that show the sixties as swinging, hippies, drugs and Woodstock... much larger and more incorrect stereotypes, as these messages cabled out again and again actually form younger generations' view of what the sixties were like...

Obviously, it also draws the natural conclusion that society should be less strict in dictating people's personal lives. I think this is sound.

[meadish_sweetball]

Ang Lee appeared at a Q&A session of another preview screening. This time it was "The Ice Storm", his post-Crouching Tiger film.

The Ice Storm is from 1997. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is from 2000.

To me and to many others, Ang Lee was the missing link between a worthwhile story (at least for Western eyes such as mine) and this type of effects. Zhang Yimou perfected the same formula in 'House of Flying Daggers'.

Parts of Crouching Tiger, unlike the earlier low-budget Chinese martial arts flicks I have seen, has some truly superb acting. If you still disagree, sit back and watch in particular the first 20 minutes again, in particular the interplay between Chow Yun Fat and Michelle Yeoh. If you cannot see or do not agree to their greatness here I guess we are too far apart in taste to be able to continue this discussion.

By the way, I haven't seen 'A Touch of Zen'. Will try to find myself a copy.

[smo]

Ang Lee appeared at a Q&A session of another preview screening. This time it was "The Ice Storm", his post-Crouching Tiger film.

The Ice Storm is from 1997. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is from 2000.

To me and to many others, Ang Lee was the missing link between a worthwhile story (at least for Western eyes such as mine) and this type of effects. Zhang Yimou perfected the same formula in 'House of Flying Daggers'.

Parts of Crouching Tiger, unlike the earlier low-budget Chinese martial arts flicks I have seen, has some truly superb acting. If you still disagree, sit back and watch in particular the first 20 minutes again, in particular the interplay between Chow Yun Fat and Michelle Yeoh. If you cannot see or do not agree to their greatness here I guess we are too far apart in taste to be able to continue this discussion.

By the way, I haven't seen 'A Touch of Zen'. Will try to find myself a copy.

I stand corrected. I should have said “post-Wedding Banquet”. I remember now that “Crouching Tiger” was Lee’s roaring comeback after the string of flops, among those “The Ice Storm”, following Wedding Banquet.

I’m glad that you remarked “at least for Western eyes such as mine” because Lee’s success and Zhang Yimou’ s riding on Lee’s coattail could not have happened precisely if it had not been for eyes such as yours. To pander to western taste, what stands for Asian culture and aesthetics simply got swept aside without much hoolabaloo. (The casting of “Memoirs of a Geisha” amply illustrates my point). Funny you should say Zhang Yimou perfected the same formula in 'House of Flying Daggers'. I couldn’t have agreed more.

Nowhere in Asia’s culture has the heroine clambering all over the hero and shoving her tongue down his throat before disrobing herself for a roll in the hay. But hey, Marilyn Monroe did it in western (I don’t mean Westerns - well, MM did those too) movies, so why not Zhang Yi Yi?

In Asia, that sort of things generally do not happen. They did not a thousand years ago, and will not a thousand years from now. I don’t know what the Chinese do in lieu of a liplock, in my Vnmese background people sniff. They still do. Some of my young Vnmese gay friends prefer to have sex with the lights out and even then they would only do it under the blanket, if not with closed eyes. Those are just a couple of illustrations re Asian sensibilities, or inhibitions if you will.

Most recently, in a Bush-like move, the Chinese government issued a ban on all movies that attempt any depiction of real life in China. Just throw in silk, brocade, build castle-in-the-sky sets and use plenty of CGI, thatta boy. That’s why the brothel in Flying Daggers looks like the interiors of Versailles. That’s why the requisite bamboo forest fight sequence appears so lifeless, one simply can’t tell a computer-rendered bamboo from a real, I mean plastic one.

Too bad there aren’t any proper dining scenes in Flying Daggers (munching on peanuts doesn’t count). I bet you before long these swordsmen would be shown eating with knives and forks, clinking long-stemmed crystal wine glasses. “Western eyes such as mine” would see nothing wrong with that! And that’s exactly how the (western) audience lap it up! Hence, Lee and his followers’ meteoric rise. (Shame on Zhang Yimou, who at one time had no need to follow nobody’s footsteps.)

Finally, I have to agree with you that Crouching Tiger is definitely superior to “the earlier low-budget Chinese martial arts flicks I have seen.” I thereby recommend the earlier HIGH-budget Chinese martial arts flicks, for a change. The stable of the defunct Shaw Brothers Studio belong to this category, replete with superior acting and realistic swordplay, albeit peppered with much nose-sniffing and fully-clothed stuffy love scenes in which the heroine occasionally tugs at the hero’s elbow sleeve as a reminder of her unbridled passion, that is if she ever got that close to him. (But maybe that doesn’t belong to the “truly superb acting” category in your book.) These SB movies are widely available throughout Bangkok video retail chains.

Back to Brokeback Mountain. You can hurl all the Globes and Oscars it is going to win at me if you want. For the life of me I just can’t see how the suffering of a closeted gay and those caused to others by his not taking responsibility of what he does and who he is deserved much sympathy. The reverential tone – something about love being “immeasurable” – earlier on in this thread kind of caught me off guard. For an instant I thought I had stepped into the Pope’s water closet (w.c. for short). Thus the urge to pass gas.

[PeaceBlondie]

I'm old enough to remember Suzie Wong's famous quote in "The World of Suzie Wong," co-starring William Holden. She was, if I recall correctly, a lady of ill repute, and she surely wasn't married to Holden's character. Her quote: "How can anything that feels so good, be bad?"

We could search literature back for centuries prior to the cinema and find that home-wreckers and adulterers have been lionized, championed, lauded and applauded.

Let's say that a straight man married the wrong woman, and then found the right woman. He leaves his wife, gets divorced, and marries the right woman, USUALLY, nowadays. So, are these two men who discovered after marriage, that they were both gay, supposed to continue in their erroneous marriages or hetero relationships, until death do part them from their wives? Not by contemporary heterosexual standards.

So let's not give awards to these two guys in a fictional screenplay adapted from a fictional novel, for being morally perfect. The last guy who seemed to be morally perfect got crucified.

Perhaps seeing this movie could help a straight man realize that gay men can be as flawed as straight men are.

[ProThaiExpat]

Speaking from one who was faced with the ethical dillema posed by Boon Mee (perhaps unintentionally) regarding a man who finds himself in a straight marriage, but realizes he is gay, I would say that my experience has proven to me that I made the right decision, which was to have my child (and even perhaps her mother) be "from a broken marriage than living in one".

His ultimate conclusion that society should be less strict on dictating to its members "how to live" really hits the nail on the head. Many gays, particularly in the fifties and sixties, were pressured into straight marriages and never permitted to truly "find themselves". Society victimized them and their spouses and children by so doing.

The "move to the right" in Thailand, the U.S. and elswhere fosters "family values" as defined by the religionists and looks backwards to an earlier era, before terrorism, as a panacia, when it fact womens rights, gay rights and human rights in general can only be imperilied by any backward look and adherence to precepts mired in antiquity, as is so prevalent in the Catholic Church.

Thailand's Buddhist tradition allows it to be free of such foolishness and is perhaps why so many gays find Thailand so accepting.

Religonists seem to view Brokeback Mountain as a film that advances the "gay agenda" and was produced to advance the "gay cause", which speaks volumes of where they are coming from.

I suspect, that if it is shown in Thailand widely, Thais will yawn and see it as a "so what" film. The yoke of Christian-Judean roots in the west has been responsible for so much pain in the human condition and what little progress is made to diminish its influence can only be cherished by rational humans.

[ChrisP]

I think the star of Brokeback is Max Factor..

Just take a look at Gylenhall's mascara and eye-liner in the very first scene in the Rancher's office... WOW! I couldn't take my eyes of it for the rest of the movie..

ChrisP

[Pujun]

i've downloaded it from www.piratebay.org and watched it over and over again..

more than 10 times , can already recite the plot.

not only the movie, i also downloaded the soundtrack CD.

The final scene is very touching...

[PeaceBlondie]

I think the star of Brokeback is Max Factor..

Just take a look at Gylenhall's mascara and eye-liner in the very first scene in the Rancher's office... WOW! I couldn't take my eyes of it for the rest of the movie..

ChrisP

Ahh, ChrisP, is that the best you can do - the guy's mascara? What about the lighting? The sound track? The scenery? The acting? The staging?

What do the gays in San Francisco think about this movie?

And did the director shoot the shadows properly?

[Pujun]

Here you are...

[ProThaiExpat]

ChrisP: Otherwise, what did you think of the movie?

[ChrisP]

I really enjoyed it. I thought the parallels between how they met and how their relationship developed were clever..

In the beginning they were only together for short times - then one of them would have to leave to go tend to the sheep herd.. During their 20-year relationship they were only together for short times then one of them would have to leave...

I also really felt for the wife, when she figured out what was going on.. her anger reflected that of my wife, when I told her..

I do think the life-lesson of "seize it now, or lose it forever.." was really made, too.. Something that resonates in me, even today.. and for my future......

ChrisP

[PeaceBlondie]

QUESTION: Which is more difficult for the woman to accept?

a. Her husband is divorcing her for another woman.

b. Her husband is leaving her for a man.

I suspect answer ( is more difficult, although both circumstances threaten her status as a female.

[Caoimhín]

QUESTION: Which is more difficult for the woman to accept?

a. Her husband is divorcing her for another woman.

b. Her husband is leaving her for a man.

I suspect answer ( is more difficult, although both circumstances threaten her status as a female.

My wife was angry when I told her I was gay and would have been angry if I'd told her I wanted to leave for another woman. Somehow the fact it was other men I fancied (noone specific) helped her to keep her confidence as a woman intact? Basically it was my fault and nothing to do with her....

Edited February 7, 2006 by Caoimhín

[PeaceBlondie]

Back to the OP: my friends in Chiang Mai can't see it in a proper cinema yet, but they bought a decent (copy) DVD of "Brokeback Mountain" and are watching the film at this very moment.

So, it should be on sale in Bangkok, right next to those stalls where a million hawkers whisper "Sex CD's" into your mother's ear as you pass by...

[ChrisP]

^ It is..

The bf just bought it.

ChrisP

[smo]

Oh Gosh, the make-up...(enough to get any self-respecting gays up in arms! - and was that a moustache that I saw on Jake?)

Hey Pujun, you didn't mean to tell me by the last stills sequence that Jake was putting on eyeliner before he went into the cabin? Sorry had to ask because I haven't seen the movie but have to start putting my Oscar bets in rows; at least I can take one off (for the make-up category).

BTW, could this be the gay-cowboy equivalent of “Same Time Next Year”? (the older crowd might remember with Ellen Burstyn and Alan Alda – she even “broke water” during one of their yearly - not weekend - rendez-vous...) I still haven't figured out the "morality" of that movie.

[LindsayBKK]

Anyone know when/if 'Brokeback Mountain' will be showing in Chiang Mai? I think it's being released in the UK while I'm on my hols in CNX and I don't want to miss it

Movie opens Bangkok 14th Feb. Check this web link for times in Chaing Mai.

Chaing Mai Showtimes

[toptuan]

Given the evolution of this discussion, sounds like we should be merging it with the make-up thread! I do have a hard time with a cowboy sporting mascara/eyeliner. But there I go with my "straight" concerns again!

[the gent]

I love movies which is probably a bit trite to say but, nevertheless, good or bad, much hyped or a lazy sleeper discovered through serendipity, schlock horror, kitsch,melodramatic or French cool, I don't care. At some point I'll be there eager and anticipating waiting for the credits to roll but every now and again I get confused when I react contrary to the mainstream. Is it me deteriorating further into my psychopathy or have I actually missed something?

Went to see Munich t'other day and caught the trailer for this movie. Couldn't stop giggling. Bit like a funeral when the conventions are well established but idiosyncracies of one's company sets us off into gales of laughter. We know it should be taken seriously but somehow it aint going to happen. Watching Heath Ledger and his chum mooning over each other up in the hills chastened by their redundant women.." You aint going up that mountain to look after sheep" or some such like was just too much to bear. Firmly fixed as a parody but without Mel Brooks but I shall catch it when it comes.

Perhaps it's just portentous American movies with " Mountain " in the title. Cold Mountain got me the same way with Renee Zolwegger strutting around like some hillbilly Groucho Marx acting herself into a comedy role that perhaps was not intended but still earned her an Oscar. Hollywood can be so kind.....

[JungleBoy]

Saw Brokeback last night. I was really disappointed. They say it is a love story, but what I saw was a story of lack of love. Maybe that's what Ang Lee was trying to say...that in those times, two people couldn't be themselves amidst all the repression, hate, secrecy and self-suppression. There were two moments when Jack and Ennis start to show their real selves, but only start...they never completely get to express themselves. It was slow slow slow. Boring really. Jack and Ennis kept smoking ciggies and it made me want to smoke. Half way thru, I wanted to go out and have a smoke. I couldn't wait for it to end. Tears? I had a slight watering in one eye for about 3 seconds and I'm really a crier at heart felt movies. Nice scenes. This movie was 20-40 years behind it's time. What a dud!

jb

[Boon Mee]

Parts of Crouching Tiger, unlike the earlier low-budget Chinese martial arts flicks I have seen, has some truly superb acting. If you still disagree, sit back and watch in particular the first 20 minutes again, in particular the interplay between Chow Yun Fat and Michelle Yeoh. If you cannot see or do not agree to their greatness here I guess we are too far apart in taste to be able to continue this discussion.

Absolutely!

One of, if not the best Asian movies I've ever watched.

In fact, I will replay that flick a couple times a year - great cinimatography and acting.