Last Scene w/ Ennis and Jack Together

[Dathan]

Ennis's breath came slow and quiet, he hummed, rocked a little in the sparklight and Jack leaned against the steady heartbeat, the vibrations of the humming like faint electricity and, standing, he fell into sleep that was not sleep but something else drowsy and tranced until Ennis, dredging up a rusty but still useable phrase from the childhood time before his mother died, said, "Time to hit the hay, cowboy. I got a go. Come on, you're sleepin on your feet like a horse," and gave Jack a shake, a push, and went off in the darkness. Jack heard his spurs tremble as he mounted, the words "see you tomorrow," and the horse's shuddering snort, grind of hoof on stone."

HELL yeah,  that's it!!!!  That flash back was Jack was saying good bye to Ennis.  I feel like I have been hit by a bolt of lightning!  I had always flagged on the look in Jacks's eyes not seeing the big picture.  A Symbolic good bye.  I could sob like a fool!  Jack had finally reached his point of no return and Ennis had no frigging idea!!!!!That is a tough call pdx.  I never thought of Jack's recollection of the embrace as a goodbye but it sounds appropriate.  At that moment of fondness Ennis is embracing him from behind as he couldn't look Jack in the face and now some 20 years later Ennis is still rejecting Jack.

Tough call but I think your right.  Let the tears flow.

[pdxbennett]

That is a tough call pdx.  I never thought of Jack's recollection of the embrace as a goodbye but it sounds appropriate.  At that moment of fondness Ennis is embracing him from behind as he couldn't look Jack in the face and now some 20 years later Ennis is still rejecting Jack.

Tough call but I think your right.  Let the tears flow.

We all reach the point of no return.  It takes more than a long distance love to fill that void in our hearts especially as the years go by.   Ennis told him that it was his (Jack's) fault that he (Ennis) was the the way he was and that he had no life.  Can you imagine what that must have done to Jack?   Jack was finally forced to accept that there was to be no compromise with Ennis.  The flash back is the ever present yearning and love for Ennis that is never going to go away.   

"If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it."  I don't believe that.  There is a third choice and that is to move on in the best way you can.  He told his parents that he was thinking of leaving Lureen and moving with Randall back to Lightening Flats.    Jack was a big dreamer and said much that did not come to pass.    But why would he put himself through that conversation with his parents if he was not seriously contemplating of it.    The Father said Jack told them in the spring.  The outcome of the summer meeting with Ennis would have forced the next step in that process. 

Then, of course, came the tire iron.   

[petetown]

Came away from my latest viewing (4th) with one phrase running through my head over and over again......
JACK: You got no idea how bad it gets.
It gets to me even more than his wish to "quit" him, which follows.
Jack had said something similar to Ennis in the joint smoking scene too.

[HunterPDX]

Ennis's breath came slow and quiet, he hummed, rocked a little in the sparklight and Jack leaned against the steady heartbeat, the vibrations of the humming like faint electricity and, standing, he fell into sleep that was not sleep but something else drowsy and tranced until Ennis, dredging up a rusty but still useable phrase from the childhood time before his mother died, said, "Time to hit the hay, cowboy. I got a go. Come on, you're sleepin on your feet like a horse," and gave Jack a shake, a push, and went off in the darkness. Jack heard his spurs tremble as he mounted, the words "see you tomorrow," and the horse's shuddering snort, grind of hoof on stone."

HELL yeah,  that's it!!!!  That flash back was Jack was saying good bye to Ennis.  I feel like I have been hit by a bolt of lightning!  I had always flagged on the look in Jacks's eyes not seeing the big picture.  A Symbolic good bye.  I could sob like a fool!  Jack had finally reached his point of no return and Ennis had no frigging idea!!!!!That is a tough call pdx.  I never thought of Jack's recollection of the embrace as a goodbye but it sounds appropriate.  At that moment of fondness Ennis is embracing him from behind as he couldn't look Jack in the face and now some 20 years later Ennis is still rejecting Jack.

Tough call but I think your right.  Let the tears flow.

Let me count the reasons why I love this film.  #86 is the sublime quality of it--how many layers of meaning there are in the performances and Ang Lee's phenomenal "Directing Without Direction" approach.

Their last scene together is Jack's realization that Ennis just can't be together with him the way Jack pictures it.  Someone else said it earlier--Jack see's reason to hope and Ennis see's reason to fear.  Admittedly, the first time I saw this movie I was more than a little peeved at the character of Ennis (I read the short story between the first and second viewings, I'll go back for a third on Thursday after about a month away).  I saw that Ennis essentially pushed him into possibly being incautious with Randall and then getting Tire Ironed (put me in the Death by Hate Crime Not Just Ennis' Imagination Category).   Not that I stayed mad for long realizing that Ennis didn't kill Jack; intolerant bigoted people killed Jack.  Also, no wonder Ennis can't move past being too afraid to commit--I'd wonder if I could given what his father showed him--mutilated body dragged and beaten in a ditch and living in a time and place where the only words describing what Jack and Ennis felt for each other were considered insults at best.

Another thing that strikes me about the scene is Ennis' reaction to Jack's trips to Mexico...the not-so-veiled threat against him for Jack going to Mexico for sex.  There's been some view of this as Ennis being possessive, and I think that's true in part.  Also, its Ennis' way of being protective.  He's worried about him getting hurt.  Haven't we all wanted to smack someone we love for doing something foolhardy?  Finally, and most simply other than jealousy and worry, Ennis is afraid.  He knows perfectly well that Jack has been asking for more than he can give, and so in the back of his mind he has to fear that the only person in the world with whom he can be vulnerable might "leave" him.  Ennis can't think of it in those terms, though.  Whenever Ennis explodes in anger, as he often does, its not because he's angry--its because he's afraid.  But you can't show fear in Ennis' place and day; you aren't taught how.  The only emotion men are taught to express is anger.

When Jack hollers at Ennis "I wish I knew how to quit you" and Ennis asks him "Then why don't you just let me be?" Ennis' fear just bubbles off the screen for me.  Ennis is really asking him "Are you going to leave me?"   Jack's own indignation and anger at the situation melts when he sees how afraid and helpless Ennis is.  That makes Jack's embrace of Ennis as he falls and the juxaposition of his recollection of the doty embrace all the more poignant as a "goodbye scene".  Jack wants to protect and comfort Ennis but he can't--not from Ennis' own ghosts.  So he holds him and doesn't want to let him go, but as he watches him drive away and remembers knows he will anyway.  Personally, I don't know if Jack would have returned to Brokeback Mountain after that point, even if he had lived. 

[shonuff07]

That is a tough call pdx.  I never thought of Jack's recollection of the embrace as a goodbye but it sounds appropriate.  At that moment of fondness Ennis is embracing him from behind as he couldn't look Jack in the face and now some 20 years later Ennis is still rejecting Jack.

Tough call but I think your right.  Let the tears flow.

   Ennis told him that it was his (Jack's) fault that he (Ennis) was the the way he was and that he had no life.  Can you imagine what that must have done to Jack?   Jack was finally forced to accept that there was to be no compromise with Ennis.  The flash back is the ever present yearning and love for Ennis that is never going to go away.   
Jack is a big dreamer, and said much that did not come to pass.... But why would he put himself through that conversation with his parents if he was not seriously contemplating of it.    The Father said Jack told them in the spring.  The outcome of the summer meeting with Ennis would have forced the next step in that process.

     

                    Hey PDX & friends,
The flashback to the dozy embrace,
that was the transition that i could not fully understand with my eyes the 1st time I saw it....But, somehow my heart was being moved so completely....somehow I knew it was the last time they would see each other in the film.....Mentally though, on 1st watch, I couldn't get the goodbye of it all.....but now, on 3rd site ( saw it 2 more times )........it's there.......he's gonna try to move on.............( still not sure if Jack would be able to ) but it hurt to the point of tears to watch all the same.....
                   And this point is so well made by whoever brought it up....... The blame Ennis places on Jack for ALL OF IT!!!
" It's because of you I'm like this...nowhere nobody...I got nothing......." In other words..If u didn't get any of this started in the 1st place ( seeing as I am not into other men...only you )........ALL THE THINGS THAT HAVE COME ABOUT ( my divorce from Alma, not marrying another woman ....a nothing life...all of it ) are on account of what you got me craving up on Brokeback Mountain....." I wish I knew how to quit you "....." Then Why Don't you.....?...Just leave me be! "                   I'm sure those words moved Jack to put thingz in order to move on..... not sure if he would have been able to completely succeed, but you can see it in his eyes....he's going to Love Ennis again, by trying to leave him be


Shonuff

[Dal]

Another thing that strikes me about the scene is Ennis' reaction to Jack's trips to Mexico...the not-so-veiled threat against him for Jack going to Mexico for sex.  There's been some view of this as Ennis being possessive, and I think that's true in part.  Also, its Ennis' way of being protective.  He's worried about him getting hurt.  Haven't we all wanted to smack someone we love for doing something foolhardy?  Finally, and most simply other than jealousy and worry, Ennis is afraid.  He knows perfectly well that Jack has been asking for more than he can give, and so in the back of his mind he has to fear that the only person in the world with whom he can be vulnerable might "leave" him.  Ennis can't think of it in those terms, though.  Whenever Ennis explodes in anger, as he often does, its not because he's angry--its because he's afraid.[...]

O yeah, I hadn't seen the "fear" element in that bit.  Sure.  
 

When Jack hollers at Ennis "I wish I knew how to quit you" and Ennis asks him "Then why don't you just let me be?" Ennis' fear just bubbles off the screen for me.  Ennis is really asking him "Are you going to leave me?"

Yes, he tries to remain his aggressive pose for as long as it takes to say "Get the fuck off me!", but then can't keep it up.  

   Jack's own indignation and anger at the situation melts when he sees how afraid and helpless Ennis is.  That makes Jack's embrace of Ennis as he falls and the juxaposition of his recollection of the dozy embrace all the more poignant as a "goodbye scene".  Jack wants to protect and comfort Ennis but he can't--not from Ennis' own ghosts.  So he holds him and doesn't want to let him go, but as he watches him drive away and remembers knows he will anyway.

The difference in Jack's two parting looks here is unforgettable for me.  Quite affecting in the short story ---

"[...] Jack heard his spurs tremble as he mounted, the words "see you tomorrow," and the horse's shuddering snort, grind of hoof on stone.

Later, that dozy embrace solidified in his memory as the single moment of artless, charmed happiness in their separate and difficult lives. Nothing marred it, even the knowledge that Ennis would not then embrace him face to face because he did not want to see nor feel that it was Jack he held. And maybe, he thought, they'd never got much farther than that. Let be, let be"
---  
but those two views of the same face say it right to the gut, don't they?

  Personally, I don't know if Jack would have returned to Brokeback Mountain after that point, even if he had lived. 

Well... if he found something better, then I don't think so.  If not, 50/50.  He didn't have much back in Childress.  

BTW  in the story they never returned to Brokeback after the first summer -- I guess because they worried about what Aguirre might have said of course, but really because Proulx (in her literary way) wants Brokeback to remain an Eden, that they cannot return to.    Riding down to the plain at the end of summer '63, after the sucker punch: "As they descended the slope Ennis felt he was in a slow-motion, but headlong, irreversible fall."  The rest of his life, I guess.  

Dal

[plc]

I wasn't sure where to include this question, whether in here or for the "Jack's Parents" scene...

Jack jokes with Ennis about how he is carrying on with Randall's wife Lashawn and laughs about how he's scared of getting shot while sneaking away to be with Lashawn.

But then we all know with the "knowing" looks and the conversation outside the benefit that Randall has extended an invitation to take up some fun time together at his bosses' cabin.  Then Jack's dad says that Jack mentioned bringing Randall up now to help whip up Lighting Flat into shape.

So I'm STILL trying to sort it out.  We all agree that he had either already started up with Randall, or at least squared away in his mind to "move on" from Ennis after their last argument and pick up with Randall if he hadn't already.

BUT - so what was the deal with mentioning Lashawn to Ennis?  Did he really have an affair with her too?  Was he just fibbing to Ennis to see what his reaction would be?

[Scott88]

plc, many people have concluded that Jack was fibbing about LaShawn.

Why would we he do this?  One possible reason is that Jack didn't want to appear "queer" in front of Ennis (which we know was a huge sore spot for him).  Another reason advanced is that Jack knew Ennis would be upset over this revelation, and so he wanted to spare his feelings. 

[shonuff07]

plc, many people have concluded that Jack was fibbing about LaShawn.

Why would we he do this?  One possible reason is that Jack didn't want to appear "queer" in front of Ennis (which we know was a huge sore spot for him).  Another reason advanced is that Jack knew Ennis would be upset over this revelation, and so he wanted to spare his feelings. 

                            Hey Scott & plc,
I agree, he wants to save face from the whole " queer " thing....Ennis' still doesn't verbalize what it is they're doing every year as far as the sexuality of it all........in the book....Ennis says that he doesn't do it with any other guyZ.......& then when asked, Jack's lies saying...( basically ) " No, I don't do it with other guyz either....this is unique to just you and me ....Brokeback Mountain got us good ".......I think he witholds the truth of his other homosexual activities for all the above said reasons....... All revolving around not hurting Ennis.......But, I think all the other coversation comes up to feel Ennis' out.....asking Ennis " So all this time and you ain't found no one else out there to marry?....." then after Ennis' telling of Cassie, Jack chimes in with LaShawn. maybe looking for Ennis' reaction...........Because, right after that and laughing......Jack says : " Tell you the truth ( as if maybe the other is just their usual B.S. ) sometimes I missyou so much...I can hardly stand it " & THAT IS THE ONLY ABSOLUTE TRUTH AND MOTIVE OF ALL OF JACK'S WORDS ON THIS LAST TRIP..... I think Jack's trying to see if there's any possible way that Ennis might consider being with him..( " all this time and you ain't found no one else to marry ?" )
                       What do you guyz think?

[ImEnnisShesJack]

That is a tough call pdx.  I never thought of Jack's recollection of the embrace as a goodbye but it sounds appropriate.  At that moment of fondness Ennis is embracing him from behind as he couldn't look Jack in the face and now some 20 years later Ennis is still rejecting Jack.

Tough call but I think your right.  Let the tears flow.

We all reach the point of no return.  It takes more than a long distance love to fill that void in our hearts especially as the years go by.   Ennis told him that it was his (Jack's) fault that he (Ennis) was the the way he was and that he had no life.  Can you imagine what that must have done to Jack?   Jack was finally forced to accept that there was to be no compromise with Ennis.  The flash back is the ever present yearning and love for Ennis that is never going to go away.   

"If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it."  I don't believe that.  There is a third choice and that is to move on in the best way you can.  He told his parents that he was thinking of leaving Lureen and moving with Randall back to Lightening Flats.    Jack was a big dreamer and said much that did not come to pass.    But why would he put himself through that conversation with his parents if he was not seriously contemplating of it.    The Father said Jack told them in the spring.  The outcome of the summer meeting with Ennis would have forced the next step in that process. 

Then, of course, came the tire iron.   

But in that scene, Ennis says he can't stand it anymore.  He's hit his own breakpoint.   He says that as he collapses to the ground in Jack's arms.

[shonuff07]

Ennis turns around ...after all the " U made me like this.....it's because of you " I'm nothing & nowhere " "

               I agree that Ennis can't take it.....it's just like real people who feel they can't.
But then,...he turns right around as usual...And sends for Jack onschedule with the postcard .....I don't think Ennis can give Jack up no matter how much he thinks " He can't take it "



             What do you guyz think ?....curious on your thoughts .

Shonuff

[Arantulkon]

First time here. I left the theater the first time in a wreak of near tears having barely kept my shit together not to be sobbing in the dark.  My partner heard a woman in front of us say the poor guy in back of me made me cry.

I have thought long and hard about this scene.  I have read the story and look to acquire the screen play to read.  I think there have been some interesting runs on this topic--the question of Jack moving on, the breaking point of Ennis, the failure of their attempts at other relationships, their return to the unresolved nature of their abiding love.

For myself, I come to the last.  The unresolved nature of their love.  The business about Jack catching Ennis up as he breaks down and falls and the rippingly intimate moment of his saying it's all right and the cut to the 'dozy scene'.  Proulx's own words remark on the virtually unchanged and unresolved state of their recovery--bound in this overwhelming love for each other.

It is true to my mind that Jack is the more flexible but whether Randall or no he is in way over his head for Ennis.  As ever.  The hurtful cut of Jack's father regarding someone else is to my mind indicative of Jack's attempt to fill out the other 49 plus weeks of the year and normalize something in his life beyond the shadow of gravity that is Ennis.

As for Ennis's breaking point, uhh, the pain.  It is the moment of greatest dramtic clarity for focusing his lostness--the essence of preparing him for the understanding that he comes to in the last part of the film--and is so carefully given the grace of Jack's comfort before his final loss.  The irresolution strikes me as a moment of grace for them both here.  Painful, flleeting and recollecting.  For me at least, Ennis's "Jack, I swear" begins to faithfully address this rupture/commitment nexus and Ennis's journey to acknowldgement of their love.

I have struggled with the drive for meaning about this scene and I guess my take away at this point relates to the process of the last part of the film and Ennis's belated yet profound recognition of how much they loved.  In some way it strikes me that Jack comes--much earlier and perhaps in this scene--to a sense of understanding in a similar way that Ennis finally does and that the undecideable nature of their relationship and the struggles and fighting with it are part of that process of being and love.  Both of them suffer intensely loss.  And both of them come out of the fire in a way remembered.  Jack in the 'dozy scene' and Ennis swearing to their shirts.  Rippingly beautiful and lonely and of love.

Ryck

[peteinportland]

Arantulkon, welcome. That was a very beautiful post.

I'm sorry folks, but I just don't buy that either of these guys were near anywhere through with one another.  Here's what Proulx writes at the end of this scene: "...they torqued things to almost where they had been, for what they had said was no news. Nothing ended, nothing resolved, nothing begun."

Proulx goes on to describe the dozy embrace, and as already stated here Jack remembers it as "the single moment of artless, charmed happiness in their separate and difficult lives." Jack knows their lives were separate, even as he remembers the dozy embrace. And still, as he ever has, he resolved to "let be, let be."

This scene was filmed almost exactly as Proulx wrote it. She wrote a tragedy about two men who shared a powerful love but who could never truly be together but who also could never truly be a part. As readers and viewers we want to fix the tragic elements of the work, but we cannot. These men forged something during one summer on Brokeback Mountain that could not be sundered either in life or in death, and from where I sit, Jack was never going to leave Ennis in either one.

[kappadappa]

I just have to say, as much as I love Jake Gyllenhaal in the whole movie, his work in this scene is absolutely incredible.  The laughter that he wrings out of the audience when he says "This is a goddam bitch of an unsatisfactory situation" which then turns on a dime and becomes heart wrenching pain.  Astonishingly adroit for such a young actor.  As brilliant as Heath Ledger is, it is Jake who controls this scene, and he does so masterfully.  I wish he were getting the accolades he deserves.

The life that shows in his face when the camera cuts back to him after the flashback.  Wow.

[mary]

I just have to say, as much as I love Jake Gyllenhaal in the whole movie, his work in this scene is absolutely incredible.  The laughter that he wrings out of the audience when he says "This is a goddam bitch of an unsatisfactory situation" which then turns on a dime and becomes heart wrenching pain.  Astonishingly adroit for such a young actor.  As brilliant as Heath Ledger is, it is Jake who controls this scene, and he does so masterfully.  I wish he were getting the accolades he deserves.

The life that shows in his face when the camera cuts back to him after the flashback.  Wow.

And you know as much as some people have griped about the aging jobs - I found him believable as older, tired and worn out - some of it may be the make up , some just the expression on his face as he shows us how much this has worn him down.