Last Scene w/ Ennis and Jack Together

[CANSTANDIT]

I do think its a mixed bag-its hard to say about the chicken or the egg, sometimes. I think their natural orientations may indeed have triggered fear in their fathers-they say children act out parents' sexual hang-ups, don't they? The bond is quite close. And that, in turn, may have caused these unenlightened tough guys to take it out on their sons....So it's all a boiling cauldron that the two sons try to keep the lid on.

I can't think to much about this, its too heartbreaking, to have to pay for the sins of the fathers....Marian and I talked about this once, how poor little Ennis had a chance to redeem a double-whammy: What was done to him, AND what was done to Jack.  To in effect, nullify those fathers' sins..Its not fair to judge him, but the chance was there, not far from his grasp.

I know you've mentioned don't want anyone losing sight of the abandonment issue, either, Sandy. I think that is of course part of Ennis's fear of loving and it get mixed in with the destruction of his homophobia.

[Ministering angel]

Essentially, AP loaded the dice in every way she could. No wonder she had sleepless nights.

[CANSTANDIT]

Essentially, AP loaded the dice in every way she could. No wonder she had sleepless nights.

yes, the failure had to happen for redemption ultimately, to take place-Ennis had to be broken down, to come back together with some semblance of the humanity Jack saw in him, in  fits and starts-he had to become, to the best of his ability, what Jack wanted. Although, it is unlikely Jack wanted him to suffer so for it....

[Desecra]

I don't know if Ennis is afraid of loving per se - he wants to get married, he wants a home, he wants a family, and even on the mountain he happily falls for Jack although he doesn't know it - I don't sense any standoffishness, or unwillingness for friendship.   He happily accepts the feeling of wanting to paw the white out of the moon and the unexpected friendship.    So I don't see him going through that 'I'll reject love, because the people who love me leave me' thing at all - it's more like the opposite, in that he wants to love, and wants to recreate family.    The problem is that he can't accept feeling that way for a man.   It's that that drives him away from his children, and stops him being with Jack, rather than a fear of love itself.

[CANSTANDIT]

Are you saying,  you think, Des, it drives him from his children for a time after he gets outed by Alma, ie, he must leave the girls as well?

[Desecra]

Yes, I think the Thanksgiving argument directly leads to him abandoning his children for a time.   It's not because he avoids love generally, I don't think.

[Rosewood]

Yes, I think the Thanksgiving argument directly leads to him abandoning his children for a time.   It's not because he avoids love generally, I don't think.

I think I agree with this.
Ennis doesn't shun love but he prefers to think that he doesn't NEED love.
Especially since love comes with so many strings attached, so much drama.
I've always said that Ennis hates drama.

It isn't love that he shuns,
it is the accoutrements.

This is the way that Ennis 'manages'.

It's easier, I suppose, to walk away than to walk TOWARDS.

[CANSTANDIT]

Love....I guess I've never really questioned that he feels love, only that he does not perhaps have a viceral understanding until he A) Holds that first baby; then B)Holds Jack in the Reunion; then C)ID's his feelings as love with the shirst, and 'Jack, I swear'..he has moments of recognition-but he does not appear to live life in the conscious act of love. He lives it in an act of survival-love is a lesson he learns.

[Ministering angel]

Nice post, Jo. I don't think he shuns love either, but I do think there is a part of him which is in self-preservation mode while he is in the realm of love. He doesn't commit fully because he knows what happens when you do - you get hurt badly, and in Ennis's case that bad hurt manifests as abandonment.

When he holds AJ he realises he shouldn't have let Jack out of his sights. Does he actually feel unqualified love for Junior?? He removes himself from her as a punishment on himself after Txgiving, but does he realise he is also punishing his girls by doing this?

Much as I don't wholeheartedly like the setup of the last scene in the film, I do see that he finally understands love in a pure form for Junior. No pulling back as he did when she wanted to stay with him.

So he's a torn man. He seeks love - a wife and children, Jack - yet he never commits fully due to his sense of self=preservation.

[CANSTANDIT]

I had never thought of it in terms of grown-up AJ..its a good point.

 I think abondonment is always there-but its tied to him not being worthy enough, too. Sort of, "if you love me something's wrong with you, cuz I'm so worthless.".
I think his grief is multi-faceted, and he has to be limited in love if he hates himself. Although i do think people who hate themselves, can love others-like I've said, I've seen it. Its a mistake to miss that there are degrees involved, IMO. No absolutes with 'love'. Unconditional almost doesn't exist-we simply adjust our love to the state of the condition, I think. Only small children and animals seem to get truly uncond love-am I a cynic or a realist? You bet.

Yours was a good post too, friend.

[CANSTANDIT]

Just a thought....

Ennis collapses with Jack's threat to quit and everything leading up to it...

He is clearly torn, if he is unable to respond, and it physically affects him-so we know the angst is a very bad thing to him. It prompts the question:
He does not verbally react to his deep emotions over Jack's words. So is he just overwhelmed? or is he torn?
What I mean is, is there a part of him that would be relieved?

[CANSTANDIT]

I see I answered my own question that got re-asked by Rosewood in the character thread! i say 'no', not relief, so much  as the inability to reconcile, it brings him to his knees, breaks his back, so to speak.....


I had another one of thus THUD thoughts-We know what Ennis meant to Jack in the DE-the all-encompassing love he never got as a baby; we see him dozing, feeling Ennis's steady heartbeat, trusting him, feeling completely safe-it is so like an infant. Something Jack could not understand nor help. It is the same as with a baby-the bay instinctively craves human contact. The world is a terrifying enough place for grown ups...

But what of Ennis? He has his mum and his dad, until they died, and perhaps until the dad tried to make a little man of him by showing him Earl..what does the DE do for HIM? perhaps it is over explained, but I had another thought about it:

What if, with Jack, Ennis is getting his childhood back, in the person of Jack? Jack's spirit, his childlike need to impress, his willingness-not to mention his diminutive size. What if the DE is about Ennis regaining, however briefly, himself? The lost boy of the Earl trauma?? True love can do that, in a certain way; bring you back to yourself, esp when the other person is so accepting. It really is tell tale how Ennis jolts them both, ie, with the shake and the push. That scene, by rights, should've wound up in the tent-but Ennis goes off, spurs jingling, flying up the ridge to the sheep-back to the straight world.

The shake and push is the reminder to both Jack and himself-come on now, you're behaving queer sleeping on your feet like a horse.

[BookJunkie]

I don't know if Ennis is afraid of loving per se - he wants to get married, he wants a home, he wants a family, and even on the mountain he happily falls for Jack although he doesn't know it - I don't sense any standoffishness, or unwillingness for friendship.   He happily accepts the feeling of wanting to paw the white out of the moon and the unexpected friendship.    So I don't see him going through that 'I'll reject love, because the people who love me leave me' thing at all - it's more like the opposite, in that he wants to love, and wants to recreate family.    The problem is that he can't accept feeling that way for a man.   It's that that drives him away from his children, and stops him being with Jack, rather than a fear of love itself.

I agree with this.  I think Ennis does want love, or at least what he sees as a 'normal' family life, but struggles to accept that he is in love with a man.  I have more I want to write about this, but I am currently at work!

[Ministering angel]

Hello BookJunkie. Please write more!

[Ministering angel]

I see I answered my own question that got re-asked by Rosewood in the character thread! i say 'no', not relief, so much  as the inability to reconcile, it brings him to his knees, breaks his back, so to speak.....


I had another one of thus THUD thoughts-We know what Ennis meant to Jack in the DE-the all-encompassing love he never got as a baby; we see him dozing, feeling Ennis's steady heartbeat, trusting him, feeling completely say-it is so like an infant. Something Jack could not understand nor help. It is the same as with a baby-the bay instinctively craves human contact. The world is a terrifying enough place for grown ups...

But what of Ennis? He has his mum and his dad, until they died, and perhaps until the dad tried to make a little man of him by showing him Earl..what does the DE do for HIM? perhaps it is over explained, but I had another thought about it:

What if, with Jack, Ennis is getting his childhood back, in the person of Jack? Jack's spirit, his childlike need to impress, his willingness-not to mention his diminutive size. What if the DE is about Ennis regaining, however briefly, himself? The lost boy of the Earl trauma?? True love can do that, in a certain way; bring you back to yourself, esp when the other person is so accepting. It really is tell tale how Ennis jolts them both, ie, with the shake and the push. That scene, by rights, should've wound up in the tent-but Ennis goes off, spurs jingling, flying up the ridge to the sheep-back to the straight world.

The shake and push is the reminder to both Jack and himself-come on now, you're behaving queer sleeping on your feet like a horse.

I think he's definitely getting back to his own childhood, to a state of true innocence (near enough) when love was the pure emotion of a child. I think the DE is sexless for Ennis because he is in that pre-sexual awareness state. He really feels love for Jack at that moment. But what has love brought him thus far? The loss of parents, engagement to someone whom he surely must have confusingly inadequate feelings about, and an affair with a man.

Ugh, shake and push. Love is dangerous and confusing.