More Oscar Preview
If there's a frontrunner at this year's Awards, it has to be Brokeback Mountain.
Directed by Ang Lee and starring Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal, this is easily the most talked-about motion picture of the year, if not the decade. With all the controversy, the criticism, the parodies, it's hard to imagine anyone visiting this blog not already familar with much of what takes place in this film. But out of respect for those who haven't seen it, my review contains absolutely no spoilers.
Brokeback tells the story of Ennis Del Mar (Ledger) and Jack Twist (Gyllenhaal), a pair of young ranch hands who over the course of an early '60s summer in Wyoming discover that they really enjoy doing things together. Things like swimming, fishing, horseback riding and just about anything else that might strike their fancy. But there's one catch: they really, really like doing things together. Like more than they've ever liked doing things with anyone else before. Herein lies the film's universality, as I think we all remember that one buddy from summer camp with whom we just could not part ways. Anyone who's been through that experience or anything similar will surely identify with the characters in this film, to some extent.
So Ennis and Jack promise to be Best Friends Forever while agreeing to keep it "on the downlow", so to speak, as they both get married and start their lives in earnest. But neither can escape the feeling that they'd really rather be doing things together. They agree to get together once a year and return to Brokeback Mountain - and who can blame them? The scenery is gorgeous. However, the wives (Anne Hathaway, Michelle Williams) get a little concerned, as wives tend to do when a husband is spending all his time horsing around with one of his close pals and ignoring the homefront. Again, this is a movie that nearly every American male will relate to, though perhaps some more than others.
As the film progresses, taking us further into the character's lives, it takes on tragic dimensions. We come to feel that Ennis and Jack were destined to do things together but their lives have been undone by society's tendency to frown upon certain people doing things together. Yes, it's a downer.
But Brokeback Mountain is also a very thought-provoking film. I thought about it an awful lot afterwards, which is odd since I've never been a fan of cowboy movies. Certain scenes replayed in my thoughts a lot - so much so that I had to mentally recast the film just to get it out of my head; my version of Brokeback stars Danny DeVito and Paul Giamatti. It's just as well-acted but a little less thought-provoking.
So cheers to Brokeback Mountain - the Best Picture of the Year!
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