Responses to Topic of the Weeks

[injest]

In a past topic, we discussed whether or not there was enough affection shown in the movie between Jack & Ennis.  There is one scene that I want to discuss regarding this:

It's the scene where we are watching Jack & Ennis on the mountain, from a distance.  They are both shirtless, and begin to wrestle.  Then we see Aguirre watching with his binoculars.

In this scene, why does Ennis cover his and Jack's faces while kissing?  Was it the director's effort not to push his luck too much, by showing another moment of physical intimacy? Or did he want to point out Ennis' reservations regarding making out in broad daylight?  Remember, in the o.s we are told that they did have sex during the day too. 


http://www.davecullen.com/forum/index.php?topic=42830.0

[injest]

I wonder if Heath Ledger didn't do that spontaniously? I know he claimed that kissing Jake was "in the end" just kissing another human being...but I felt he wasn't overly comfortable with it. Maybe he was betraying a little hesitation and Ang Lee left it like that because it jibed so well with the whole "buttoned up Ennis" thing?

[huntinbuddy]

I wonder if Heath Ledger didn't do that spontaniously? I know he claimed that kissing Jake was "in the end" just kissing another human being...but I felt he wasn't overly comfortable with it. Maybe he was betraying a little hesitation and Ang Lee left it like that because it jibed so well with the whole "buttoned up Ennis" thing?

Don't know about the 'buttoned up' thing, but would suspect he unzipped more than a few times on all those fishin trips over the years! 

[injest]

Don't know about the 'buttoned up' thing, but would suspect he unzipped more than a few times on all those fishin trips over the years! 

sure ENNIS did...but I think Heath had a bit more reticence(sp)

new topic:

Does anyone feel that Alma remarried rather quickly after her divorce from Ennis?  Perhaps too quickly?  And why Monroe? 

and here is Charles' response:

I have a feeling it was rather quick.  The SS tells us that when Alma Jr. was nine and Francine seven she divorced Ennis and married the Riverton grocer.   Doesn't say anything about a few months or a year or two, but then again, Annie uses words very sparingly in the SS.   My best guess is it was less than a year.   The screenplay gives the divorce as November 1975, and then we see Ennis is there with Alma and Monroe for Thanksgiving dinner and he notices Alma is perhaps four to five months pregnant.   The screenplay gives this as Thanksgiving 1977, which would be two years.   I say it was less than a year....final answer.      As for it being Monroe....Alma simply sees security and emotional needs being met more to her satisfaction than what she had with Ennis.
 
 

I think Alma had already formed an attachment to Monroe, my reading of the SS was that she LEFT Ennis to marry Monroe...as Jeff Foxworthy says "if she didn't have the new pony cut from the herd, the saddle HAD been pulled from the barn"..she wasn't staying home embroidering while Ennis was up there on the mountain (which would explain why we never heard anything more about that younger daughter...) 

[Artiste]

I think that Heath ledger was on drugs and just pretended to do his acting role, most times.

Unfortunately!

The reward should have went to Jake Gyllenhal as Jack Twist in the Brokeback Mountain movie, instead, as he did his acting wonderfully, so much so that he was in love with Heath who refused him!

Any comments anyone?

Au revoir,
hugs!

[injest]

from Milo:

Here's how I see this.

When I was a teenager, I discovered that I liked sex girls. Less than a year later, I discovered that I liked sex with boys too. Until the age of 25, I thought I was bisexual. That was almost 2 years into my 23-year relationship with my man. The first time I had sex with a boy, I did not think that I was a homosexual. So I get what Jack and Ennis were thinking when they said that weren't queer. As far as they knew, they weren't.

I also don't think that either Jack or Ennis thought of themselves in terms of a specific sexual identity as people do today. They thought of themselves as plain, simple, men. I see no evidence in either story or movie that indicates that the fact that they loved each other gave them a categorical identity. Yes, they knew that they did sexual things that heterosexual men do, and they also knew that they did sexual things that homosexual men do. But I don't think there was much worry about a specific state of being. What there was much about was how society would treat them because of their love.

When Ennis asks if this happens to other people, I think he's talking about the seeming contradiction of having sex with women, and being in love with a man at the same time. He certainly knew men who loved and had sex with women. He knew of at least 2 men that had sex with each other. But both? I think that was beyond his experience and comprehension.

As for why either of them brought up the topic of who else they were fucking, I see that a sign of intimacy between them. Openness. Telling their buddies about their sexual conquests can be bragging. It can also be an act of intimacy, especially with long-time, close friends.

These revelations do not appear to me as hetero posturing, or assertiveness. Jack & Ennis knew how they felt about the other, and I believe that each knew how the other felt about himself. So neither braggadocio nor assertiveness makes sense as a motivation for their statements. They both know what's up. 

it always amuses me to see people believing that Jack and Ennis, two uneducated rural boys in the sixties, would have more insight and certainty about their emotional life than any of US do today as teenagers...as you say here, that living in a city in today's world, kids have questions and dilemnas about their sexual identities..

here's my take on the situation: kids experiment, boys I think play around more than girls do..fact of life...you never hear of girls having peeing for distance contests, there is no slang equivalent for 'circle jerk' for girls...boys goof around..and that's what they call it...just playing around. But that's kid's stuff...when you become a man, you are supposed to put that kid's stuff behind you..

Maybe Ennis's whole dilemna and all that second guessing: "does this happen to other people" is because he realizes that he and Jack are no longer 'playing around', that they are past the point where it isn't something that would be overlooked if someone found out?

Anyone that thinks that there wasn't some sexual carrying on out west has never given it a lot of thought...it's similar to the whole prison thing...when men don't have access to women, rather than stick strictly to their own right hand, they'll turn to each other. Doesn't mean everyone in prison that gets a blowjob is gay. There may have been a different level of tolerance of it here and there but I think it happened more than we acknowledge.

and country people, as much as they want to paint us as otherwise, tend to be 'close to the earth' as it were...sex isn't some exotic thing we have to go to the internet or some bookstore to find information on..it's right outside our front door and we understand we aren't that far above the animals as far as our sexual natures go.

[bradINblue]

Most boys have played with each other during those few 'developing' years. Inevitable with the rush of testosterone and such. And many, many men find ways to get off with each other--not just in prison or the military (bookstores, parks, etc) because they just wanna have sex, doesn't matter with who and there isn't an emotional attachment. Jack and Ennis weren't 12-14 year old boys. While only 19, they were men and at the peak of the testosterone. They fell 'emotionally' for each other before the FNIT. That is what is so beautiful about the story and that which rarely happens--1960's or the 21st century.

Men like Jack and Ennis aren't suppose to be 'gay', and despite all of today's tolerance around, it still isn't a safe environment for guys like them. I don't blame most of the religious right in this country. I blame the left who require one to be a card carrying progressive liberal in order to really be gay. Also, the 'gay culture' as currently defined by the QAFish fabulous, Hollywood, and the anti-men feminists. Kinda like how feminists treat Michelle Bachman......

Brad

[Artiste]

Merci Injess!

It is still a puzzle as you say:

  In this scene, why does Ennis cover his and Jack's faces while kissing?  Was it the director's effort not to push his luck too much, by showing another moment of physical intimacy? Or did he want to point out Ennis' reservations regarding making out in broad daylight?  Remember, in the o.s we are told that they did have sex during the day too. 


     

What do you think?

Au revoir,
hugs!

[Artiste]

Merci Brad!

I am very happy that you describe:

  Men like Jack and Ennis aren't suppose to be 'gay', and despite all of today's tolerance around, it still isn't a safe environment for guys like them.       

But why are you saying, if you can detail more:

  I don't blame most of the religious right in this country.     

And may I use some of your saying on PF?


Au revoir,
hugs!

[Artiste]

Even after Brokeback Mountain movie, many homosexuals are being murdered like in that film just because they are peaceful persons and gays, in 2011?