How Brokeback affected me

[DaveinPhilly]

Am I alone in feeling that as Brokeback Mountain is leaving theaters, it feels a bit like losing an old friend?  The DVD is out in a few days. I have seen the screener, and I did pick up more feeling from the actor's expressions, especially Jake's. In fact, I feel the film might have been shot with the idea it might go straight to DVD. It has those kinds of close ups that used to be more commonly seen only on the small screen. I suppose that is as much do the fact the majority of movie money these days is in the DVD market.
Well... Later all... I got a letter to the Editor to figure out. I put a note about that over on the Future Project Ideas thread.

Yeah, I think that's why some folks are a bit edgy in their posts lately. I can sure feel the loss welling up in me!

[mcnell1120]

nellie: please do not think you have ever been ignored. you are in our hearts and like all of us here, we take strength from each other. we are on this upward trail called "evolution" and in time, we'll make it to the top of the mountain. but it's a long old climb.


bless you,

jake

Thanks.....I needed that !!

Nellie 

[Cameron816]

nellie: please do not think you have ever been ignored. you are in our hearts and like all of us here, we take strength from each other. we are on this upward trail called "evolution" and in time, we'll make it to the top of the mountain. but it's a long old climb.

bless you,
jake

Thanks.....I needed that !!

Nellie 

Nellie-
We're now going into a second phase of lose and that somehow we're now being left in our tailers, just as Ennis was at the end of the movie.  I too get this lump in my throat when I begin to think of this. But this is the time for us to take action and use the knowledge we have learned by this experience... This is where we write our own end to the movie....I have already started to kick myself in the ass and get out of this funk.  Always feel free to reach out and email any of us who have email addresses, and I strongly advise those to post your email in your profile.  Because if we go right back to where we came from after this time is over, what have we gained?  Always remember how this movie made you feel so badly about lost relationships and lost connections and how you wished you had kept them... you now have that second chance.  My biggest regret now is I only wish this movie had come out sooner, but then again, the world may not have been as ready for this as it is now.  Start with the very last line of this movie, Jack (or Ennis), I swear.... to make things different.

Now is all we have.  It's only a beginning....

-Cam

[Garry_LH]

Ok, I don't know who to ask. This is a first draft of a letter to the editor of my local news paper. (he has publised really long letters of mine before)  If anyone wants to give me feed back, spelling and other hints, that is of the way good.

If others think this is a good idea, should we start another thread? Or, is this still speaking to the affect this film is having in our lives?
Garry

Brokeback Mountain

Ever since I saw Brokeback Mountain, the second week after it opened in Columbia to record ticket sales, I have been wondering why audiences have such a vastly differing responses to it. Some have found it an ok movie. Some have judged it as promoting immorality, without ever having seen the film. For many men and women, both gay and straight, Brokeback Mountain has been a spiritual awakening. Calling a Hollywood film a spiritual awakening may seem a bit strange, until you start digging into the history of this film. Brokeback Mountain was first published in the 'NewYorker' with in a day to year before Mathew Shepard was murdered in Wyoming. I recently listened to an interview Annie Proulx, the Wyoming author, did for KCRW. In there she said it was like a power from above was guiding her as she struggled through the six months it took to find the right words to describe these two men's lives in her thirty pages.  Ang Lee the director himself has said it was like they felt like the spirit of the story was telling itself while they were filming. Often, these words have been echoed through many online discussion groups. I have especially noticed this theme in the forms of www.davecullen.com/brokebackmountain/  Yes, we are the same folks that took out the add in 'Variety' thanking everyone involved with Brokeback Mountain that you might have read about.

It is in how people are affected by this film, that I feel Spirit has brought to some of us so touched by the story of Jack and Ennis, that continues to amaze me. There are those that saw gay men in a different light for the first time in their lives. Those who had buried the memories of their own Jack or Ennis, only to have all of those feelings brought to them as if they were yesterday. Those men and women that were just going through the motions of life, and now find themselves involved in dialog with their spouses and partners, as they find themselves even deeper in love than they have been before. And yes, those that have examined their own lives to find, 'this is one bitch of an unsatisfactory situation', and they have decided to make those changes in their lives to get themselves to that emotional and spiritual mountain of their own; a life and a love worth the living.

So if when the DVD of Brokeback Mountain comes out in a few days, and you feel like you have been deeply touched by by this story in  ways you can't yet fully define, come on over to Dave's for awhile. Read through the treads, speak from your heart. You'll find a lot of folks are trying to understand why this movie touches our souls so powerfully, and even a few ideas of what we can do about that.
Garry Hunsaker
Mexico, Mo.

[BayCityJohn]

Garry: It's a great letter. I have a little trouble with one sentence. You might want to redo it. Also, Mathew is spelled Matthew.

Brokeback Mountain was first published in the 'NewYorker' with in a day to year before Mathew Shepard was murdered in Wyoming.

[Garry_LH]

Garry: It's a great letter. I have a little trouble with one sentence. You might want to redo it. Also, Mathew is spelled Matthew.

Brokeback Mountain was first published in the 'NewYorker' with in a day to year before Mathew Shepard was murdered in Wyoming.

This is part of why I like to ask others, and to put a letter for publication away for a few days to reread it. Thanks for catching my misspelling of Matthew's name. At least, I can get that much right for him.
I'll take that sentence out by itself and flog it around for awhile. Hmmm... then by then, I'll have to change available in a few days to in stores now.

[DaveinPhilly]

Gary_LH did you mean a year to the day? Also invite people to read the threads at Dave Cullen..

Great letter.
DaveinPhilly

[Zuraffo]

^^^

My suggestion, if you want to draw a spiritual link between Matthew's death and BBM, you need to put it down in more earthly explanation before people started freaking out. I would have said avoid it altogether, but that's the central idea of your letter, so... good luck writing it!

[TomS]

My partner and I are going to see it one more time tonight.  Of the 3 or 4 theaters still playing Brokeback in the Chicago Metro area, the one we're attending is just a mile from our house, in a fairly conservative suburb of Mt. Prospect.  Seems like poetic justice.  We know it may be the last time we'll see it on a large screen in a long time.  If there's anyone out there in Chicagoland who can make it to the 7:00 show in Mt. Prospect, it will be nice to have your fellowship during the final show (or, if you like, our own Last Picture Show). How can I describe its effect on me?  Many of you have said it very well.  It comes over me like a sympathetic whisper.  Probably the most gently heartbreaking experience I've ever had.  Impossible to be detached.  Quietly powerful but not depressing; strangely soul-cleansing and empowering.

 I know I'll be coming back to this site a lot.  I'm still pretty new to it and some of you seem ready to move on but it will be nice to continue the rapport with everyone for a while longer.  Will be interesting if to see if we're still going strong during next year's Oscar season  The postins might get real interesting!  Anyway, thanks to everyone for your kindness and support, I hope to make some connections with some of you before long.
Tom S.

[DaveinPhilly]

My partner and I are going to see it one more time tonight.  Of the 3 or 4 theaters still playing Brokeback in the Chicago Metro area, the one we're attending is just a mile from our house, in a fairly conservative suburb of Mt. Prospect.  Seems like poetic justice.  We know it may be the last time we'll see it on a large screen in a long time.  If there's anyone out there in Chicagoland who can make it to the 7:00 show in Mt. Prospect, it will be nice to have your fellowship during the final show (or, if you like, our own Last Picture Show). How can I describe its effect on me?  Many of you have said it very well.  It comes over me like a sympathetic whisper.  Probably the most gently heartbreaking experience I've ever had.  Impossible to be detached.  Quietly powerful but not depressing; strangely soul-cleansing and empowering.

 I know I'll be coming back to this site a lot.  I'm still pretty new to it and some of you seem ready to move on but it will be nice to continue the rapport with everyone for a while longer.  Will be interesting if to see if we're still going strong during next year's Oscar season  The postins might get real interesting!  Anyway, thanks to everyone for your kindness and support, I hope to make some connections with some of you before long.
Tom S.

Ejoy it tonight! Same thing here in Philly - ends tonight. Some of us are in for the long haul so the future will prove to be interesting.  Soul cleansing and powerful - how true. One cannot imagine too many films bringing this much discussion into play.
Always interested in what comes up during any viewing, so give us a report.
DaveinPhilly

[TomS]

Thanks for your reply Dave, I sure will report in tomorrow.  You do the same.  --Tom

[hayek_uk]

"Brokeback" is returning in 10 days time for 3 screenings over 3 days at the Arts Cinema on the university campus where I work. One screening is at 6.30 pm so I have asked around among colleagues if they want to all go together and see it after work. Looks like 20-odd will be going, and it's even spread to other sections and they're joining in too. Perhaps it will be like BBM's boxofffice - by the time it shows, we'll have enough people to fill the cinema!

I have to report that I found it a lot easier to ask women (of whom there are more), than men. So there I am - completely out, frequently having gay-based conversations and jokes with the men just as much as the women, and concerned the men might turn down the idea flat. Of course, none of them have yet, and one (a very stright, but very cool guy) was really delighted at the idea.

I've been asking people one-to-one (rather than sending round a horrible impersonal e-mail) and have always started by telling people that a bunch of us are going to the campus cinema after work, and the date --- and they don't look very interested. Then I say "to see Brokeback Mountain" and their faces light up. It's like they always wanted to see it but didn't ever manage to.

Only two turn-downs so far, both from people who have seen it, neither of whom I really know. One a late teenage girl who clearly did not enjoy it (I didn't ask why); and a mum who said she had got taken by her 15-year old daughter. She said she thought it was an excellent film (she loved the scenery!), but that it dragged at the end; and she was surprised how graphic the sex scenes were for a 15 year-old (but then added that her daughter thought it was all cool so she didn't mind!) Clearly her daughter doesn't take her to the movies very often. I wondered what prompted this visit, but did not ask.

A couple of gay students who do part-time work for us are also coming, so it should make for a really interesting cross-section. I think some of my colleagues are going to be strongly affected, and from what they say are not prepared! I know some of them really well, and I can be pretty sure many of them will have reactions like us.

[DaveinPhilly]

"Brokeback" is returning in 10 days time for 3 screenings over 3 days at the Arts Cinema on the university campus where I work. One screening is at 6.30 pm so I have asked around among colleagues if they want to all go together and see it after work. Looks like 20-odd will be going, and it's even spread to other sections and they're joining in too. Perhaps it will be like BBM's boxofffice - by the time it shows, we'll have enough people to fill the cinema!

We look forward to your report!

[Wolf]

Hayek, wow, what an INTERESTING time you're going to have!

You must report back anything and everything from the viewing - I'm sure I'm not alone in wondering how it'll go for your colleagues.

Incidentally, for some odd reason, your words about your colleagues being unprepared made me think of childbirth  .  it's one of only two other things (the other being crazy in love) as painfully euphoric as BBM, and for which you can NEVER be prepared.  Doesn't matter how much and how often you're told it hurts like hell, but it's glorious, you're completely floored by just HOW MUCH it hurts like hell and just how glorious it is.

Perhaps those sensitive souls going in for viewing #1 aught to be offered an epidural at the door 

w

[amymm]

Incidentally, for some odd reason, your words about your colleagues being unprepared made me think of childbirth  .  it's one of only two other things (the other being crazy in love) as painfully euphoric as BBM, and for which you can NEVER be prepared.  Doesn't matter how much and how often you're told it hurts like hell, but it's glorious, you're completely floored by just HOW MUCH it hurts like hell and just how glorious it is.

Perhaps those sensitive souls going in for viewing #1 aught to be offered an epidural at the door 

w

Wolf-I love the childbirth analogy.  I never thought of it that way.  I have given birth three times-and it's so true that it leaves you euphoric-but it's painful as all get out.  It's also quite addictive.  If it weren't for having to raise the children afterwards, I would give birth over and over.  I once heard someone describe it as a drug addiction.

The movie is also incredibly addictive.  You want it over and over again-even though you know it'll hurt like hell and it's so beautiful at the same time.  I never had an epidural-and I think an epidural only numbs or kills the pain.  Maybe the people who aren't moved by the movie are already numb.  I have  friend like that.  She said the movie didn't speak to her.  I already suspected she had stopped feeling anything a long time ago.  Now I know it.

Amy